Revelation

Study - 15

15. The Mark of the Beast Revelation 13:11-18 The Beast out of the Earth In our previous study, we looked at the Rise of the Antichrist, focusing our attention on Revelation 13:1-10. In chapter 12, we read of a war that will take place in heaven, and Satan, the loser of the fight, will be cast down to Earth. Knowing that his time will be short, Satan will work through a leader, commonly called the Antichrist or the Beast from the sea (13:1), as well as a false religious leader called the False Prophet (Revelation 19:20), forming a trinity of evil to manifest his power on Earth. In this study, we look more closely at what the False Prophet will do during the last seven years of this age. This False Prophet will be a religious figure and perform miraculous signs and force people to worship the first Beast, the Antichrist. Just like John the Baptist pointed away from himself to the Lord Jesus, this false prophet will point to the Antichrist and Satan to be worshiped (Revelation 13:4). He will come on the world scene looking to all intents and purposes as a lamb-like person (v. 11), but inwardly he has the dragon, Satan, dominating his life. This false religious leader will do two things, which will cause true Christians (saints) to rebel against the authority of these two men: 11Then I saw a second beast, coming out of the Earth. It had two horns like a lamb, but it spoke like a dragon. 12It exercised all the authority of the first Beast on its behalf, and made the Earth and its inhabitants worship the first Beast, whose fatal wound had been healed. 13And it performed great signs, even causing fire to come down from heaven to the Earth in full view of the people. 14Because of the signs it was given power to perform on behalf of the first Beast, it deceived the inhabitants of the Earth. It ordered them to set up an image in honor of the Beast who was wounded by the sword and yet lived (Revelation 13:11-14). 1) He will set up an Antichrist image that speaks and demands worship, threatening death to those who refuse (Revelation 13:14-15). We are not told where this image is set up in this passage, but perhaps, it ties in with Jesus' warning to the saints that, "when you see standing in the holy place the abomination that causes desolation, spoken of through the prophet Daniel—let the reader understand—then...there will be great distress" (Matthew 24:15, also v.21). (The KJV uses the word tribulation, and the NIV uses the word distress). 2 Thessalonians 2 also mentions this same time, when Paul the Apostle said that the Antichrist would "exalt himself over everything that is called God or is worshiped, so that he sets himself up in God's temple, proclaiming himself to be God" (2Thessalonians 2:4). 2) He will force everyone to comply with his demand to worship an image of the Antichrist and Satan and to take a mark signifying allegiance to their regime. We will focus most of our time on what this Mark will be. ​ The Mark of the Beast 15The second Beast was given power to give breath to the image of the first Beast, so that the image could speak and cause all who refused to worship the image to be killed. 16It also forced all people, great and small, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hands or on their foreheads, 17so that they could not buy or sell unless they had the Mark, which is the name of the Beast or the number of its name. 18This calls for wisdom. Let the person who has insight calculate the number of the Beast, for it is the number of a man. That number is 666 (Revelation 13:15-18). In the original text of the Scriptures, the Hebrew and Greek letters of the alphabet are associated with numbers. This is similar to the Latin Alphabet where V is five, X is 10, L is 50, and C is 100. One will be able to take the name of a person suspected to be the Antichrist and translate his name into Greek or Hebrew and calculate if his name comes to 666. There is much that can be researched into numbers of names, but it is beyond our scope in this study. Our focus is more on what the mark will be. There is never a time in history when the whole world was ever in a situation when nothing could be bought or sold without using cash. With the use of credit cards and bank accounts with computers, we are in a time when buying and selling can be facilitated entirely without paper money. Just about everything you buy in the stores now has an RFID tag (Radio Frequency Identification) that records and tracks every bit of information about the product from production to the home. This small tag is on the wrapping or printed on the product. The information on each tiny chip, some as small as the period at the end of a sentence on this page, has a little antenna read by electromagnetic energy beamed to it from a reader device. It is different from barcode technology. The reader device allows the item to be remotely identified as each chip has its unique number. With barcode technology, every can of Coca Cola, for instance, has the same UPC or barcode number (a can of Coke in Toronto has the same number as a can of Coke from Cincinnati), but now, with RFID technology, each can of Coke has a unique ID number. All buying and selling will be digital, with each product bought linked to people, their ID, home address, telephone number, etc. Everything about them will go to a central hub and track their buying habits. The second way it's different from a barcode is that these chips can be read from a distance, right through your clothes, wallet, backpack, or purse, without your knowledge or consent, by anybody with the right reader device. In a way, it gives strangers the ability to spy on you, i.e., to identify both you and the things you're wearing and carrying. Imagine walking through a doorway and having a hidden reader device identify the books in your briefcase and the brand of your underwear. Not only will everything have its own chip, but plans are nearly complete for every person to have a chip embedded under the skin that can be read at the point of sale. Below are two YouTube video links of commercials that illustrate how a chip like this can work. ​ Fujitsu's Store of the Future https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mdML1IEw3tI&feature=youtu.be How Alibaba got Consumers to Love Grocery Shopping: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uEbYNJZ9iJ4&feature=youtu.be The commercials above show how RFID is changing shopping. At first, mobile phones will be used to transfer money to the grocery store, followed by everyone having a chip in one's hand passed over a reader device, bank details read, and digital money transferred. This idea sounds terrific to some because if a person is suspected of being a terrorist, his every move and everything he buys can be tracked. There will come a time when, if a person does not have a chip embedded in his skin in the future, he will not be allowed to buy or sell. We believe that, without one's health information that will be on the chip, it is likely that a person will not get past the door into the grocery store in a health crisis. IBM has even developed a device named the "person tracking unit" that can zero in on your RFID tagged products and use them to watch you like a hawk. Many people who don't read the Bible are already warning others of the loss of privacy and freedom at our doorstep. Reader devices will be placed on major roads tracking the tag in every car produced. Some major highways in Chicago, Miami, and other cities already have reader devices that take money out of your bank account when you go through a place on the toll road. For a certain amount of money, you can watch your teen's speed and location while he or she is using your car. They won't be able to hide their location. There are good reasons that this technology will be useful and helpful. Many people will welcome a personal chip embedded in their skin, especially when it comes to people's stealing your identification data. With terrorism a significant concern, some will argue that having such a chip mandatory for everyone would be in the majority's best interest, claiming that it is for the safety or the common good of the people, thus making it worth sacrificing privacy and freedom. It is said that the Royal family of England have chips embedded somewhere in their skin so that, if they are kidnapped and held for ransom, they can be easily found via satellite. Think of the advantages for the military. If a US fighter pilot were downed over enemy territory, his location could be seen on a map via a satellite-tracking unit. Think of the benefits for clothing stores: security chips can be attached to products, and clothing items would not be stolen; a remote reader device would be set off near an exit. Everything on planet Earth will be tracked via RFID. There will come a time when nothing will be bought or sold except that it has the stamp of ownership on it to Antichrist's world kingdom. Taking the Mark of the Beast will be equal to selling your soul to the Antichrist. There will be a commitment along with the Mark to worship Antichrist's image: If anyone worships the Beast and his image and receives his mark on the forehead or on the hand, 10he, too, will drink of the wine of God's fury, which has been poured full strength into the cup of his wrath. He will be tormented with burning sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and of the Lamb (Revelation 14:9-10). Click on this link to a video to see some of the things happening in our world: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BWgUTrvRlA4 We are living in a world that is changing fast, and not always for the better. Jesus said: "When these things begin to take place, stand up and lift up your heads because your redemption is drawing near" (Luke 21:28). We live at a point in time when we need to be intimately acquainted with Christ and to practice our obedience to His voice and walk by faith. When it comes to new technology, are you an early, mid, or late adopter? How do you respond to new technology? The Advance of Technology Talking about how many technological inventions have been created, Charles H. Duell, the director of the U.S. Patent Office, was once quoted as saying, "Everything that can be invented has been invented."1 Can you believe he said that in the year 1899? Then, there was Robert Milliken, Nobel Prize winner in physics, who said in 1923, "There is no likelihood man can ever tap the power of the atom."2 Another was Lord Kelvin, president of England's Royal Society (a scientific organization); he noted in 1885, "Heavier-than-air flying machines are impossible." The speed of technological change in the last days is something that was spoken about 2,500 years ago by the prophet Daniel: 3And they that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament; and they that turn many to righteousness as the stars for ever and ever. 4But thou, O Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book, even to the time of the end: many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased (Daniel 12:3-4 KJV). ​ Some time ago, I was invited to go with a friend to shoot some shotguns at clay targets, or skeet's, as most people know them. It took a bit of time getting used to shooting at them because I kept shooting at the target as I saw it. The problem was that the skeet wasn't standing still when I fired my shotgun; it was moving through the air at quite a speed. I learned that I had to fire ahead of the target to be able to shoot it down. When companies on the cutting edge of technology are planning a new device, such as the Apple iPhone, for example (just how many of these will they come up with?), Apple has to think five or six years ahead when they start planning where technology will be when they want the iPhone 20 to come out onto the market. Why? Because there is no point in starting to design an iPhone based on where technology is right now. It would be like my shooting at those skeets and missing the target. They have to consider Moore's law, or else they will be pitifully behind the goal when they put it on the market. Moore's law—what is it? Gordon E. Moore, the co-founder of Intel Corp, writing in his 1965 paper about the pace of technology change, said that the number of transistors one can put on a microchip double about every eighteen months to two years. In 1970 just over one thousand transistors could be put on a chip, whereas, in January 1995, the Digital Alpha 21164 microprocessor, held to be the most remarkable technological breakthrough ever, had 9.3 million transistors. Six years later, a microprocessor contained more than 40 million transistors. As I write in 2020, it is reported that the Cerebras Wafer Scale Engine, made by artificial intelligence company Cerebras Systems, is the largest semiconductor chip ever built with a Central Processing Unit or CPU having 1.2 trillion transistors.4 Technology is changing at an exponential rate. The Approaching Singularity Some time ago, I came across an article in Time magazine about the coming Singularity. Some of you may not be familiar with the term Singularity as it relates to technology, so let me explain. Lev Grossman, the person who wrote the article, was sharing the thoughts of Ray Kurzweil, a computer scientist, inventor, futurist, and also a director of engineering at Google. Kurzweil wrote a book called The Singularity is Near. I quote from Lev Grossman's Time article: Kurzweil believes that we're approaching a moment when computers will become intelligent, and not just intelligent but more intelligent than humans. When that happens, humanity — our bodies, minds, and civilization — will be completely and irreversibly transformed. He believes that this moment is not only inevitable but also imminent. According to his calculations, the end of human civilization, as we know it, is about 35 years away. Computers are getting faster. Everybody knows that. Also, computers are getting faster -faster — that is, the rate at which they're getting faster is increasing. True? True. So if computers are getting so much faster, so incredibly fast, there might conceivably come a moment when they are capable of something comparable to human intelligence, artificial intelligence, or what is known as artilect. All that horsepower could be put in the service of emulating whatever it is our brains are doing when they create consciousness — not just doing arithmetic very quickly or composing piano music but also driving cars, writing books, making ethical decisions, appreciating fancy paintings, making witty observations at cocktail parties. If you can swallow that idea, and Kurzweil and many other brilliant people can, then all bets are off. From that point on, there's no reason to think computers would stop getting more powerful. They would keep on developing until they were far more intelligent than we are. Their development rate would also continue to increase because they would take over their own development from their slower-thinking human creators. Imagine a computer scientist that was itself a super-intelligent computer. It would work incredibly quickly. It could draw on vast amounts of data effortlessly. It wouldn't even take breaks to play online games. It's impossible to predict the behavior of this smarter-than-human intelligence with which (with whom?) we might one day share the planet because if you could, you'd be as smart as they would be. But there are a lot of theories about it. Maybe, we'll merge with them to become super-intelligent cyborgs, using computers to extend our intellectual abilities the same way that cars and planes extend our physical capabilities. Maybe, artificial intelligence will help us treat the effects of old age and prolong our life spans indefinitely. Perhaps, we'll scan our consciousnesses into computers and live inside them as software, forever, virtually. Maybe the computers will turn on humanity and annihilate us. The one thing all these theories have in common is the transformation of our species into something that is no longer recognizable as such to humanity circa 2011. This transformation has a name: The Singularity. The difficult thing to keep sight of when you're talking about the Singularity is that even though it sounds like science fiction, it isn't, no more than a weather forecast is science fiction. It's not a fringe idea; it's a serious hypothesis about the future of life on Earth.5 Now, by quoting a magazine article such as this, I am not in any way saying that I would agree with or support such ideas. Frankly, the view of a new and "improved" humanity ("humanity 2.0") as some people refer to it, makes me shudder. However, I also believe that we should be aware of what some people are proposing and working towards. Someone who does not see or acknowledge humanity's spiritual component may view our species' transformation only as a positive thing. The idea presents many ethical and moral dilemmas, which are being voiced by church leaders and even those in the scientific community who have ethical misgivings about such advances. You may think, "God will never let it happen." I am not sure how far it will be allowed to proceed; however, there are many things about which we could say the same thing if we were to be able to go back in time and view our present world from a worldview lens, of say, just a mere 200 years ago. Technology has already made advances in science and medicine possible. What concerns, if any, do you have about this type of technology? Where do you think it could be heading? Ray Kurzweil, in his book, The Singularity is Near, says: "The impending Singularity in our future is a period during which the pace of technological change will be so rapid, its impact so deep, that human life will be irreversibly transformed...The key idea underlying the impending Singularity is that the rate of change of human-created technology is accelerating and its powers are expanding at an exponential pace. Exponential growth is deceptive. It starts almost imperceptibly and then explodes with unexpected fury."6 Then, there are also knowledge explosions in the exploration of DNA. Begun formally in 1990 and with a budget granted that was more than that spent on getting to the moon and back, the Human Genome Project was an effort coordinated by the U.S. Department of Energy. It projected to take fifteen years, but because of the rapid technological advances, the project was finished two years early in 2003. What is a Genome? And why is it essential to our future? A genome is the entire DNA in an organism, including its genes. Genes carry information for making all the proteins required by all organisms. These proteins determine, among other things, how the organism looks, how well its body metabolizes food or fights infection, and sometimes, how it behaves.7 We can now genetically modify food and have been doing it for some time. Along with changing structures at the genetic level and building things with nanotechnology, many other technologies are coming together. When the Singularity arrives, sometime between 2030 and 2045, we are about to enter that era when, like Tom Horn, the writer of the book Forbidden Gates says: ...the trend toward smaller and smaller technologies will yield greater-than-human machine intelligence. That sort of super-intelligence will increase not by self-replication but by building other agents with even greater intelligence than itself, which will, in turn, build more superior agents. The result will be an "intelligence explosion" so fast and so vast that the laws and certainties we are familiar with will no longer apply. That event-horizon is called the Singularity. Our version 1.0 natural bodies are frail and subject to a myriad of failure models. The Singularity will allow us to transcend these limitations...we will gain power over our fates. Our mortality will be in our own hands, and the nonbiological portion of our intelligence will be trillions of trillions of times more powerful than unaided human intelligence. We are now in the early stages of this transition. The acceleration of change is causing a paradigm shift [a fundamental change in approach or underlying assumptions]...as well as the exponential growth of the capacity of information technology is both beginning to reach the "knee of the curve," which is the stage at which an exponential trend becomes noticeable. Shortly after this stage, the movement becomes explosive. Soon, our technology's growth rates—which will be indistinguishable from ourselves—will be so steep as to appear nearly vertical. The Singularity will represent the culmination of the merger of our biological thinking and existence with our technology, resulting in a world that transcends our biological roots. There will be no distinction, post Singularity, between human and machine.8 Trans Humanism—the Future Homo Sapiens 2.0 The new field of technology that is happening right now in our lifetime is Trans-humanism. Trans-humanism is a cultural phenomenon. It is the effort to change the human species to be what some would like it to be: Homo Sapiens 2.0. It is humanity re-designing humanity, and there are many brilliant minds today working toward this end. Some would consider it to be a vast improvement to our present human state with all its limitations. Again, I am not saying that I agree with this in any way. However, serious thought is being spent on this idea (and billions of dollars of money spent by governments and the private sector in various countries). Technological Singularity brings with it the ability to combine our natural biological bodies with machines. Scientists can now merge DNA from animals to humans and human DNA to animals with the mapping out of DNA. DARPA, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency here in the USA, has been given billions of dollars to research the altering of soldiers' genetic code, modifying bits of DNA to fashion a new type of human. Soldiers that will be modified into Homo Sapiens 2.0 will function as a machine, killing tirelessly for days and nights on end. They will be mutations that will revolutionize the current order of battle and guarantee operational dominance across the whole range of potential U.S. military employments.9 Our technology labs are now working on advanced gene therapy, which can provide cheetah or gorilla quality muscles in people enabling them to run forty-five miles per hour or five to ten times the strength of an average human.10 There is also talk of merging eagle DNA with human DNA to enable future snipers to see much better than regular humans. John Horgan, a former senior writer for Scientific American, states that DARPA "is already investigating the possibilities of cyborg warriors downloading complex fighting procedures directly into their brains, like the heroes of the Matrix. DARPA is interested in the development of techniques that can survey and possibly manipulate the mental processes of potential enemies by recording signals from the brains of enemy personnel at a distance, to read their minds and to control them."11 If you could access such technology, what would you change about yourself? How will this affect us as Christians? The fast-approaching Singularity will bring with it another terrifying development that, I believe, is mentioned in the Book of Revelation: 16It also forced all people, great and small, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hands or on their foreheads, 17so that they could not buy or sell unless they had the Mark, which is the name of the Beast or the number of its name. 18This calls for wisdom. Let the person who has insight calculate the number of the Beast, for it is the number of a man. That number is 666 (Revelation 13:16-18). On September 12, 2005, Chief Justice John Roberts was questioned at his confirmation hearing, and then-Senator Joe Biden was interviewing him on the "Micro-Chip." Senator Biden tells John Roberts: "And we'll be faced with equally consequential decisions in the twenty-first century. Can a microscopic tag be implanted in a person's body to track his every movement? There's an actual discussion about that. You will rule on that — mark my words — before your tenure is over." The micro-chipping of citizens is part of Obamacare! Chief Justice John Roberts ruled on this, just as Joe Biden said he would. The Obama Health care bill under Class II (Paragraph 1, Section B) specifically includes ''(ii) a class II device that is implantable." YouTube link below: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o3eER_zO1tQ I always wondered why Scripture was so emphatic about the significance of this "mark of the beast," and why would it be in two places, head or hand? God has seen the end from the beginning. He exists outside of time and knows the future thoroughly, and He has shared what will happen with His people in the Word of God. Whatever this Mark is, it causes a separation among the people of the Earth. It's like Elijah issuing his challenge on top of Mount Carmel with the people of Israel: "21Elijah went before the people and said, "How long will you waver between two opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him; but if Baal is God, follow him" (1 Kings 18:21). God says that those who take this Mark will suffer torment. They will be punished with the full strength of God's fury: 9A third angel followed them and said in a loud voice: "If anyone worships the Beast and its image and receives its Mark on their forehead or on their hand, 10they, too, will drink the wine of God's fury, which has been poured full strength into the cup of his wrath. They will be tormented with burning sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and of the Lamb. 11And the smoke of their torment will rise for ever and ever. There will be no rest day or night for those who worship the Beast and its image, or for anyone who receives the Mark of its name." 12This calls for patient endurance on the part of the people of God who keep his commands and remain faithful to Jesus (Revelation 14:9-12). What is this Mark? I believe it's not just that we will align ourselves against God by taking it; indeed, we are not to worship the Antichrist or Satan, but it may be more than what we know today as an RFID chip embedded in people's hands. I think it is also mentioned to be in the head because many will choose to have a Brain-Computer Interface chip in their head to enhance their brainpower many millions of times over. We cannot be dogmatic about such possibilities; only when the time comes will we have light to know exactly what the Mark is, but let's try and get our head around this new technology. With Brain-Computer Interfacing (BCI) technology, a person will access information via the Internet through thought alone. Advancements in technology going on even now indicate that this is just a matter of time, but it could happen in the 2020-30 timeframe. Does this sound crazy? You might not be aware that Elon Musk has a company called Neuralink and has already developed a machine to implant a BCI chip into people's skulls. I have included a footnote to a YouTube link to help you understand what Elon Musk and Neuralink are doing.12 There is also another link to Elon Musk's plan to merge humans with Artificial Intelligence.13 These brain chips will allow consumers to control a host of new electronic and communication gadgets through neural commands. Developers at Toyota and the University of Utah are also working on brain transmitters, which they hope will contribute to building a global "hive mind," a "borgification" of humanity, to use a Star Trek analogy. What on Earth is a hive mind? It is the concept that many people share their knowledge or opinions, producing collective intelligence and uncritical conformity. Of course, there will be a Queen Bee of this hive who will shape this collective intelligence, and this writer believes that person to be the one the Bible calls the Antichrist. Will the Antichrist use brain interface technology? How do you think this technology will affect people's free will, personal freedom, and faith? If these things are possible, what will this type of advancement mean to what humanity will achieve? For example, someday, the parents of a thirteen-year-old may have to face the day when their son or daughter comes home from school and asks to become "Trans-human." The Brain-Computer Interface will enable them to access the Google data banks, the hive mind, or whatever it will be called then— (perhaps the Beast?). If they go ahead and have the implant, their son or daughter will instantly know any historical question, geographical question, or any question thrown at them. They will have access to artificial intelligence, perhaps accessing it wirelessly via the Internet with brain interfacing chip technology. Imagine going for a job interview and being asked if you have the Brain-Computer Interfacing technology that allows you to think thousands of times faster than others. Only those with the chip will rise to the top of the corporate ladder. Those who are not connected with the chip in this way will be left out "in the cold." They will not be part of Humanity 2.0. They will be left behind in intelligence and opportunities available to them. Life will be considerably harder for anyone who chooses not to be a part of this development, which will seem only advantageous at first. However, (and whenever this happens), as I stated before, there will come along with the Mark, the command to worship. There will be a choice that people will be forced to make (If you want to be part of the in-crowd) that will cause them to align themselves with the Anti-Christ and with his world system. I do not believe that people will be in any doubt at that point as to the significance of this decision. If indeed, it is connected to this idea of becoming Trans-Human, it is evident that a person will automatically be surrendering something of his or her humanity. It will change what it means for us to be human. Free thought will be challenged. Those who take the Mark of the Beast will upload into a system from which they can pull data, but it would also cause them to opt into a system that can influence and even control them. Isn't that what the enemy of our souls has sought to do from the beginning? When Adam and Eve were tempted in the Garden of Eden, the temptation was to be "as gods, knowing good and evil" (Genesis 3:5). The temptation was to eat from the tree of knowledge. This will likely be a vast tree of knowledge available to all who plug into it. The desire, as some have openly stated, is to "transcend our humanity." In 2 Thessalonians 2:4, we see a prophecy that the Anti-Christ will enter the temple of God and proclaim himself as a god. He wants to achieve god status, to be "as a god." There has been a lot of talk in the scientific community and even in popular films, such as Avatar and Transcendence, and books about what it means to be human. The temptation will be to leave Homo Sapiens 1.0 behind: When Satan approached Eve in the Garden of Eden, he said to the woman: ...For God knows that when you eat it, your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil (Genesis 3:5). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5tn4P7IBqoQ If the clip's link is not working, go to YouTube and put in the search box, Most People Don't Even Know What's Coming. 23 mins. Do you see any correlation between this passage and the idea of humanity 2.0? In what ways is this temptation similar? This is the temptation that Satan has offered man, i.e., to be as gods, to transcend our humanity and be more than human with Satan's being god over humanity: ​ How you have fallen from heaven, O morning star, son of dawn! You have been cast down to the Earth, you who once laid low the nations! You said in your heart, 'I will ascend to heaven; I will raise my throne above the stars of God. I will sit enthroned on the mount of assembly' (Isaiah 14: 12-14). We see this same thought presented as a temptation when Jesus went into the desert to fast. Satan came and took Christ to a very high mountain. As He looked down from the mountain, Satan showed Jesus all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor. "All this I will give you," he said, "If you will bow down and worship me" (Matthew 4:9). His aim has always been the same: to transcend the state he has been given and worshiped as God himself. In the same way, he is tempting humankind to transcend our humanity and create a super-human race. Satan never gave away anything for free, and I don't think this ability to be Homo Sapiens 2.0 will be free. It will cost people their souls. As with many things that become available, it could be that, at first, only the elites, the rich, and those with influence will either be able to afford this or will be allowed to be augmented into Humanity 2.0. Those who reject the Mark or are not connected to the Beast system will be shut out. Those who are in but refuse to "worship" any time will have their switch shut down, and they will die. The Scripture says, "so that the image could speak and cause all who refused to worship the image to be killed (Revelation 13:15). ​ Once a person is connected to it, they will be forced to worship the one that will gain control over the whole world. i.e., the Antichrist. Another thing to remember is that Scripture tells us of a time when some people on the Earth will not be able to die, even though they will want death: In those days men will seek death and will not find it; they will long to die, but death will escape them (Revelation 9:6). Doesn't that sound weird? I know I am stretching your minds here, but those who take the Mark of the Beast may have the opportunity to upload their consciousness into the hive mind or some supercomputer. At that point, they will no longer be biologic beings; they have become Trans-human or Humanity 2.0. All information about everyone that takes this upgrade to their humanity will be on this hive artilect (artificial intellect). I believe that this "hive intellect" will be at the disposal of the Antichrist, giving him supreme power to be like a god; thus, they that take the Mark will become his slaves and have to worship him. For homework, take a look at the video that I have provided a link to below: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UmaczzTUR5M I found the above links by searching on YouTube with the words Transhumanism. When we consider all these things, it is easy to become anxious or afraid. However, Paul gives some good advice to the Thessalonians when he tells them: "But you, brothers, are not in darkness, so that this day should surprise you like a thief. You are all sons of the light and sons of the day. We do not belong to the night or the darkness. So then, let us not be like others, who are asleep, but let us be alert and self-controlled, putting on faith and love, as a breastplate and the hope of salvation as a helmet" (1 Thessalonians 5:4-8). These words are excellent advice for us today. We should not be asleep but be aware of the times in which we live and look forward to the time when Christ returns. Until then, we put on faith, hope, and love. He has also promised us that He will be with us until the end of the age (Matthew 28:20). If you have never entrusted your life to Christ and turned from your sin, today is a good day to do that. The Lord is as near as a prayer. He will not force His way into your life. God has given you the gift of free will, and the door to welcome Him into your life is on your side. Call on the Lord Jesus Christ and sincerely ask Him to fill your life with His love and grace. He stands waiting. Father, I have messed up time and again with my life. I come to You today, seeking Your forgiveness for what I have done wrong (my sin). I understand that You sent your Son to pay the penalty that I brought on myself. I believe that Christ died for me, and, as a result, His sacrifice of Himself is the just payment for my sin. Help me from now on to live for You. I receive Your gift of mercy and grace today. Amen. For further study via YouTube, you might want to search for: Trans-humanism Part 1/Mark of the Beast: The Ultimate Agenda. Keep in mind that it was posted online in 2013. Here's the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mwh4ShZA5Tg Keith Thomas Email: [email protected] Website: www.groupbiblestudy.com All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version, Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984 by Biblica, Inc. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights are reserved worldwide. 1 2 3 4 5 http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,2048299,00.html. 6 Ray Kurzweil. The Singularity is Near. Penguin Books, pages 7-8. 7 8 Tom and Nita Horn. Forbidden Gates. Defender Publishing Group, page 131. 9 Chris Floyd. "Monsters, Inc: The Pentagon Plan to Create Mutant Super-Soldiers." CounterPunch (1/13/03). 10 11 Tom and Nita Horn. Forbidden Gates. Published by Defender Publishing Group, Crane, Missouri, page 215-16. 12 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0jOjh6lwp9w&list=FLxEG-SJj6MLejcSt9m5NeRA&index=22 13 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4fGYT-glICA Looking for something slightly different?Click here to discover all of the available series that group Bible Study offers free of charge!

Study - 4

4. The Open Door into Heaven Revelation 4 In my teens and early twenties, I worked with my father on his commercial fishing boat, the Why Worry, which was quite a joke because I was always worrying about what would happen next. Commercial fishing is one of the most dangerous jobs on the planet, and I had extra to worry about because our nets were trawling for fish on the bottom of the North Sea and the English Channel. These fishing grounds are where two world wars have been fought with unexploded magnetic German mines occasionally caught in our nets. After handling several, good-condition mines caught in our nets, I would hear that quiet voice in my mind asking me, "What would happen to you if the mine had gone off?" That soft, inner voice motivated me to search for the meaning of life and for answers as to what would happen to me after I died. I read books of people who claimed they had gone to heaven, and they just never rang right to me. When I came to a point in my life where I began to search the Scriptures, Old and New Testaments, only then did I have an awareness that I had found the truth. I put it to you, the reader, that only in the Bible will we see the truth about heaven and hell and find out about eternity. After John the Apostle wrote down Christ's message to seven specific churches in Asia Minor, now known as Southwest Turkey, the Lord had something special for him, i.e., a trip to heaven. He described what he saw in heaven: ​ The Throne in Heaven ​ 1After this I looked, and there before me was a door standing open in heaven. And the voice I had first heard speaking to me like a trumpet said, "Come up here, and I will show you what must take place after this." 2At once I was in the Spirit, and there before me was a throne in heaven with someone sitting on it. 3And the one who sat there had the appearance of jasper and ruby. A rainbow that shone like an emerald encircled the throne. 4Surrounding the throne were twenty-four other thrones, and seated on them were twenty-four elders. They were dressed in white and had crowns of gold on their heads (Revelation 4:1-4). After John wrote down the letters to the seven churches, he saw before him a door standing open. In the previous chapter, John had witnessed a closed door symbolizing how closed in spirit the Laodicean believers had become to the Lord and His desire for a close relationship with His church (Revelation 3:20). The intimate relationship John had with the Lord Jesus was perhaps the reason that he was chosen to see what will yet take place on earth. Intimacy with Christ precedes revelation as to God's purposes. Any so-called prophet should be scrutinized as to the fruit of the Spirit in his life and the intimacy that he has with Christ. The call of the Lord to come up through the open door immediately brought John into an experience of being "in the Spirit." What do you think John means by being "in the Spirit?" Did he leave his body on earth? What do you think? We should not think that this is "astral traveling" or anything that New Age thinking would have us believe. Neither is John taking drugs or occult means to have an alternate reality. John was always in full control of his spirit. This experience was similar to the Apostle Paul, who did not want to boast about himself and the experiences he had with God. He writes in the third person about being caught up to the third heaven: 2I know a man in Christ who fourteen years ago was caught up to the third heaven. Whether it was in the body or out of the body I do not know—God knows. 3And I know that this man—whether in the body or apart from the body I do not know, but God knows— 4was caught up to paradise and heard inexpressible things, things that no one is permitted to tell (2 Corinthians 12:2-4). In the case above, Paul was not permitted to share what he saw, or maybe, what he saw was beyond words for him to communicate. What John witnessed was also hard for him to describe. The first thing he notices is the booming voice speaking to him like a trumpet (v. 1), recalling what it was like for Israel at the foot of Mount Sinai when God spoke from the mountain to them like a loud trumpet that made them quake with fear at the sound of His voice (Exodus 19:16-25). Israel pleaded with Moses that God's voice, like a trumpet, was too overpowering for them. They asked Moses to speak instead of them to God (Exodus 20:19-20). When John writes about what he saw, he doesn't describe what God looks like. He writes in terms of the colors of the glory emanating from the throne of God. This inability to see God is similar to Paul's statement about the glory of God in his letter to his protégé, Timothy: who alone is immortal and who lives in unapproachable light, whom no one has seen or can see. To him be honor and might forever. Amen. (1 Timothy 6:16). God is spirit and invisible and unseen (1 Timothy 1:17). Moses was allowed only to see the backside of the Lord: 18Then Moses said, "Please show me Your glory." 19"I will cause all My goodness to pass before you," the LORD replied, "and I will proclaim My name—the LORD—in your presence. I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion." 20But He added, "You cannot see My face, for no one can see Me and live." 21The LORD continued, "There is a place near Me where you are to stand upon a rock, 22and when My glory passes by, I will put you in a cleft of the rock and cover you with My hand until I have passed by. 23Then I will take My hand away, and you will see My back; but My face must not be seen" (Exodus 33:18-23). The only one who has seen God in His fullness is the Lord Jesus, Who said, "No one has seen the Father except the one who is from God; only he has seen the Father" (John 6:46). John the Apostle was aware that a person was sitting on the throne, but John described His appearance as having the colors of jasper (ἴασπις) and ruby (σάρδιον) (some translations have carnelian). Scholars have difficulty with the color of the jasper stone, for the color varies greatly. The modern jasper stone is somewhat dull and opaque; whereas, the jasper referred to in the Scriptures is called "a very precious jewel" in Revelation 21:11, and "clear as crystal." Our best understanding of Jasper, therefore, could be that of a diamond that has the appearance of different colors depending on one's perspective. John also describes the glory of the One on the throne in terms of the color of a sardius stone, also known as carnelian, and translated as a ruby in the NIV. Both stones were part of the ephod that the high priest wore (Exodus 28:18). Surrounding the throne was a rainbow of emerald colors (v. 3), perhaps meaning different hues of green. Ezekiel the prophet also saw this same rainbow around the throne: Like the appearance of a rainbow in the clouds on a rainy day, so was the radiance around him. This was the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the LORD. When I saw it, I fell facedown, and I heard the voice of one speaking (Ezekiel 1:28). John then describes seeing twenty-four other thrones encircling the throne of God, with twenty-four elders in white robes with crowns of gold on their heads (v. 4). We should not think of these elders as angels, for it would be inappropriate to call angels elders, for angels do not age; they are eternal beings (Luke 20:36). Angels are never described in the Scriptures as having crowns on their heads, but believers who overcome self, sin, and Satan, are described as wearing crowns of victory. We must remember that John was taken outside of time and space to view a scene that in our time and space has not happened yet. These elders could be representatives of those throughout the church age that God alone knows. Some say that the twenty-four are representative of the twelve sons of Israel (Revelation 21:12) and the twelve Apostles (Revelation 21:14), and that is a possibility. We should be reminded, though, of Jesus' words to James and John when they were looking for a position to the right and left of Jesus. He said to them, "You will drink the cup I drink and be baptized with the baptism I am baptized with, 40but to sit at my right or left is not for me to grant. These places belong to those for whom they have been prepared" (Mark 10:39-40). It is possible that these elders could be believers alive today and being greatly used by God. It could also be that the figure of 24 is taken from 1 Chronicles 24:1, where David divided the priesthood of Israel into twenty-four courses of priests. The priests in that scripture could be a type, picture, or shadow of the body of Christ called to be "a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God's special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light" (1 Peter 2:9). The white linen robes that the overcoming elders are wearing symbolize "the righteous acts of God's holy people" (Revelation 19:8), with the crowns [stephanous] representing the crowns given to overcoming believers now made kings and priests to our God (Revelation 5:10; 1 Corinthians 9:25; Revelation 2:10; 3:11). In the letters to the seven churches in Revelation 2-3, what were some of the promises given to those who overcame? How should it encourage believers all over the world who are going through persecution and possible martyrdom? Worship of the Creator What John saw then was a scene reminiscent of the time when the people of Israel stood together at the foot of Mount Sinai (Exodus 19:16-18) after the nation came out of Egypt: 5From the throne came flashes of lightning, rumblings and peals of thunder. In front of the throne, seven lamps were blazing. These are the seven spirits of God. 6Also in front of the throne there was what looked like a sea of glass, clear as crystal. In the center, around the throne, were four living creatures, and they were covered with eyes, in front and in back. 7The first living creature was like a lion, the second was like an ox, the third had a face like a man, the fourth was like a flying eagle. 8Each of the four living creatures had six wings and was covered with eyes all around, even under its wings. Day and night they never stop saying: "Holy, Holy, Holy, is the Lord God Almighty, who was and is and is to come!" John now experienced the glory of the Creator God as an awesome sight of lightning, rumblings, which this writer takes to be a vibration that causes the ground under John's feet to quake, along with peals of thunder. What an awesome thing it will be to stand before this holy God in that day when all men will give account to Him: "I tell you, on the day of judgment people will give account for every careless word they speak (Matthew 12:36), So then each of us will give an account of himself to God (Romans 14:12). Thank God that all who believe have a Savior who has paid our account for us! In the next chapter, Revelation 5, comes the opening of the seven-sealed scroll, i.e., the opening of which leads up to the judgments of God. What a terrible day it will be for those who are outside of Christ. John then noticed a sea of glass, clear as crystal before the throne (v. 6). John may see the reflection of the Lord's glory in the sea of people standing before the throne. These believers had overcome the enemy: "And I saw what looked like a sea of glass glowing with fire and, standing beside the sea, those who had been victorious over the beast and its image and over the number of its name" (Revelation 15:2). This sight of God's people could be the answer to the prayer of the Lord Jesus in the upper room when He prayed, "The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one" (John 17:22). Some things in the Book of Revelation are symbolic or representative of something in the natural world. What could the description of the living creatures represent? How does their activity affect those before the throne? John then writes about four living creatures that are continually worshipping the Lord. These living creatures could represent all of creation, the lion being noble as the king of beasts, the eagle as being the highest of the birdlife, the ox is the strongest of animals, and the living creature having the face of a man representing the crowning creation of God, man. We see all of God's creation standing before the Lord in worship and adoration for all He has done. Up until this time, the whole creation has been groaning in travail (Romans 8:19-23) for God's crowning creation, man, to come into God's fullness: "until the fullness of the Gentiles be come in" (Romans 11:25 KJV). In the day in which we live, we are watching God at work in shaping and calling the Gentiles from all tribes, peoples, and languages (Revelation 7:9) into the fullness of the covenant of faith spoken to Abraham, "In you all the families of the earth shall be blessed" (Genesis 12:3). John then saw the expression of thanks to God from His creation, i.e., the taking off of the crowns of victory and laying them before the Lord, for He alone is the One who gives us the victory (1 Corinthians 15:57). 9Whenever the living creatures give glory, honor and thanks to him who sits on the throne and who lives for ever and ever, 10the twenty-four elders fall down before him who sits on the throne and worship him who lives for ever and ever. They lay their crowns before the throne and say: 11"You are worthy, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for You created all things; by Your will they exist, and came to be" (Revelation 4:5-11). Whenever ancient kings were defeated, the sign of their submission was that of the giving of their crown to the victor of the battle (2 Samuel 12:28-30). In more recent history, it became the sword of the opposing general. John saw a picture of all overcomers who have gained crowns of victory, laying their crowns before the Lord, Who alone has given them the victory. We all bow our heads to You, Lord God Almighty, for all You have created, shaped, and molded to reflect Your glory. Grant that each of us on that day to be all that You desire us to be. Amen!

Study - 5

5. Who is Worthy to Break the Seals? Revelation 5:1-14 I had the privilege of living in Israel for more than a year and a half, and I have led many tours to this beautiful and unique land. Having fought five major wars in its existence, the people of Israel are in a constant state of readiness for any conflict that may threaten their existence as a nation. That is why when planning to house the precious, ancient Dead Sea Scrolls, they built a place where the scrolls could survive any kind of explosion, safely protected deep underground at the Shrine of the Book in Jerusalem. The Dead Sea Scrolls consist of passages of the Hebrew Bible, or Old Testament, considered to be more than 2,000 years old. They comprise the earliest copies of Biblical text ever found. There is one scroll that is even more precious than those in Jerusalem, the scroll that is in the hand of the Almighty God sitting on the throne in heaven. As we come to chapter five of the Book of Revelation, we must remember that the chapter divisions came more than four hundred years after the New Testament was written, and were not something divinely inspired. Chapter five, therefore, should be read as a continuation from chapter four of John's vision of seeing what takes place in the throne room of heaven. As chapter five begins, all watching the scene before them are unsettled at what took place next: ​ The Lamb Takes the Scroll 1Then I saw a scroll in the right hand of the One seated on the throne. It had writing on both sides and was sealed with seven seals. 2And I saw a mighty angel proclaiming in a loud voice, "Who is worthy to break the seals and open the scroll?" (Revelation 5:1-2). What do you think makes this scroll so significant? Why is someone worthy needed to break the seals and open the scroll? The big question before us is what is the importance of this particular scroll, and why is it sealed with seven seals? In ancient days, scrolls were made of papyrus or parchment and had columns of writing on them. The length of the message determined the size of the scroll. For instance, the complete scroll of the prophet Isaiah kept at the Shrine of the Book in Jerusalem is twenty-four feet long, with fifty-four columns of text. When the scroll was finished, it was rolled up, and if it was a legal document, it required witnesses to apply hot wax to the rolled-up scroll and put their seal into the wax. The outside of the sealed scroll contained a brief summation of what was written inside. John Walvoord wrote, "Roman law required a will to be sealed seven times as illustrated in the wills left by Augustus and Vespasian for their successors." Some scholars believe the scroll represents God's will and final settlement of the affairs of all the earth, while others believe that the scroll represents the title deed to the physical creation. John's eyes are drawn to focus on the importance of this scroll seen in the right hand of God. Voiced by a mighty angel, the challenge to the universe rings out for all to hear is: "Who is worthy to break the seals and open the scroll?" (v. 2). The picture is of an authoritative call loudly proclaimed through the universe to find someone worthy who could break Satan's hold on the planet. This satanic bondage came about when Adam gave up his dominion when he obeyed the voice of the evil one in the Garden of Eden, where Satan was symbolized as the serpent (Genesis 3:6). 3But no one in heaven or on earth or under the earth was able to open the scroll or look inside it. 4And I began to weep bitterly, because no one was found worthy to open the scroll or look inside it (Revelation 5:3-4). As the loud voice of the angel reverberates through the universe, at first, there is no reply. No one is found worthy, which causes John to weep bitterly. Before we go on, we must understand the reason for John's intense sobbing. Let's consider the circumstances in John's life that led up to this point. John was a man who left his profession as a fisherman and threw his entire life into walking with the Messiah. He had desired to be at Christ's right hand in the kingdom of God (Mark 10:35-37). His brother, James, also an Apostle of the Lord Jesus, was the first martyr killed with the sword at the hand of Herod Agrippa (Acts 12:1-2). John had sacrificed everything, including being present for his family, to be available for the mission of Christ. Like a true soldier of Christ, John faithfully carried on his life's purpose and became a leader of the churches in Asia Minor, the same churches that, at the age of ninety-two, he wrote warnings in the second and third chapters of Revelation. Think of how he must have felt when he heard the Lord's word to the church of Laodicea, the church which caused the Lord to declare his judgment against them, stating that they had become lukewarm (Revelation 3:20). All this occurred after John was burned in oil and yet did not die, and now he was suffering banishment on the isle of Patmos. How encouraged he must have felt when he was told in chapter 4:1, "Come up here, and I will show you things which must be hereafter." Perhaps, his longings for his ministry would finally be realized in what he would see! Instead, he heard no one respond to the call for someone worthy to open the scroll. For most of his life, he had been waiting for the fulfillment of all the promises of God, and now he sobs greatly to find no one worthy to break the power of Satan, sin, and death reigning over the planet. However, John was too hasty to weep, for one of the elders commands him not to weep and to look again as someone appears to open the scroll, someone from the royal line of David, the lion of the tribe of Judah: 5Then one of the elders said to me, "Do not weep! Behold, the lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, has triumphed to open the scroll and its seven seals" (Revelation 5:5). ​ The Lion of the Tribe of Judah Throughout human history, people have longed to see good triumph over evil and righteousness to prevail over injustice. Humankind has struggled with all types of suffering caused by slavery to sin. Darkness prevailed due to evil forces, but there is One who has triumphed, not only for Himself but as the first fruit for all of humanity and creation itself (1 Corinthians 15:20). He broke the invisible chains on the human heart for everyone who will come to Him and receive new life. Jesus the Messiah has triumphed to open the scroll! Any Jew with an understanding of Jewish history knew of the prophecy of the One like a lion from Judah. On his death bed, Jacob, or Israel, to which his name was changed, prophesied over the future of each of his twelve sons that became the twelve tribes of Israel. Jacob prophesied accurately about the tribe of Judah: 8"Judah, your brothers will praise you; your hand will be on the neck of your enemies; your father's sons will bow down to you. 9You are a lion's cub, Judah; you return from the prey, my son. Like a lion he crouches and lies down, like a lioness—who dares to rouse him? 10The scepter will not depart from Judah, nor the ruler's staff from between his feet, until he to whom it belongs shall come and the obedience of the nations shall be his (Genesis 49:8-10). Jacob prophesied that from the tribe of Judah would come the leadership of the nation. The scepter (v. 10) was a rod or staff that symbolized power or authority, a scepter such as that held out to Queen Esther to approach the King of Persia (Esther 5:2). The lion is the king of beasts, whereas, a lion's cub or young lion is exceptionally brave, knowing no fear in its strength and vigor. Jacob further spoke that the tribe would be like a lioness, said to be even fiercer than the male lion. Under the inspiration of the Spirit, Jacob went on to say that One would come from the line of Judah, who would take the throne of not only Israel but also the nations of the world (v. 10). Later, after David, the greatest king of Israel passed away, the prophet Isaiah went on to prophesy further that the greater King from the line of David would appear on the scene and lead the nation: 1Then a shoot will spring up from the stump of Jesse, and a Branch from his roots will bear fruit. 2The Spirit of the LORD will rest on Him—the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and strength, the Spirit of knowledge and fear of the LORD. 3And He will delight in the fear of the LORD. He will not judge by what His eyes see, and He will not decide by what His ears hear, 4but with righteousness He will judge the poor, and with equity He will decide for the lowly of the earth. He will strike the earth with the rod of His mouth and slay the wicked with the breath of His lips. 5Righteousness will be the belt around His hips, and faithfulness the sash around His waist (Isaiah 11:1-5). This Messiah King would come from the stump of Jesse, the father of King David, called the Root of David (Revelation 5:5), a descendant of the royal line of King David. The scepter of kingly leadership would not depart from the line of David until the One to whom the kingdoms of the world (Revelation 11:15) rightly belong shall come (Genesis 49:10). Christ's birth in Bethlehem of Judah, the hometown of Jesse and David, was in fulfillment of all these prophecies. So, amid his tears, John looked again for a lion in the throne room; instead, he saw a Lamb: 6Then I saw a Lamb who appeared to have been slain, standing in the center of the throne, encircled by the four living creatures and the elders. The Lamb had seven horns and seven eyes, which represent the seven Spirits of God sent out into all the earth. 7And He came and took the scroll from the right hand of the One seated on the throne. 8When He had taken the scroll, the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb. Each one had a harp, and they were holding golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints. 9And they sang a new song: "Worthy are You to take the scroll and open its seals, because You were slain, and by Your blood You purchased for God those from every tribe and tongue and people and nation. 10You have made them to be a kingdom and priests to serve our God, and they will reign upon the earth" (Revelation 5:6-10). Why is Christ Seen as a Lion, yet also a Lamb? How will both sides of His character be seen throughout history? Yes, John saw One from the tribe of Judah (5:5) and the kingly line of David, but Christ's victory over Satan came about by His being a sacrificial Lamb. The Greek language speaks of a little lamb, a young Lamb that took a Jewish person back to the time of Passover when they sacrificed a little lamb in the prime of life (Exodus 12:5) to deliver them from Pharaoh's slavery in Egypt. How can a lamb take on the beast of the Book of Revelation? (Revelation 13:1). He overcame Satan by purchasing salvation by giving His blood as the purchase price. "For the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than human strength" (1 Corinthians 1:25). Man is seen as sold into slavery because of giving up his dominion over the earth to the serpent (Satan) in the Garden of Eden (Genesis 1:26-28). When Adam and Eve obeyed the enemy rather than God, they were cut off from the source of life and the tree of life, and they came under servitude to Satan, a very real and evil spiritual being. The penalty for sin that was passed down to every human being is death (Romans 6:23), and the only way out of slavery to Satan was for a fully perfect man to pay the penalty for him. A man cannot pay the price for another man (Psalm 49:7), but God, the creator of all things, by His redeeming value as a substitutionary sacrifice, could pay the penalty for man. Jesus, the God-Man, purchased all who will receive His free gift of salvation and come under His covenant of love. "You are not your own; 20you were bought at a price. Therefore, glorify God with your body" (1 Corinthians 6:19-20). In the passage above, Paul the Apostle wrote to the Corinthian church about how they were bought at the cross with the Savior's blood. What do you think it means to glorify God with your body? This Lamb bore the scars of wounds received by being a lamb sacrificed, yet He was still alive (v. 6), bearing the wounds in His hands and feet by being a substitutionary sacrifice. The longing of Israel, and all believers everywhere, will come when Messiah comes in power and will roar from Zion as a lion, but that is still yet to happen at a later time in John's perspective as he now watches the Lord Jesus take the scroll: The LORD will roar from Zion and thunder from Jerusalem; the earth and the heavens will tremble. But the LORD will be a refuge for his people, a stronghold for the people of Israel (Joel 3:16). For now, John sees a Lamb having seven horns, the number of completeness, symbolizing the One with all power. Along with the seven horns were seven eyes, i.e., the full seven-fold ministry of the Holy Spirit's ability to see and know all things (Isaiah 11:1-2), "for God gives the Spirit without limit" (John 3:34). John considers this Lamb as standing in the center of the throne of God (v. 6) and taking the scroll from His Father seated on the throne. All heaven broke out in worship as Christ took the scroll. The elders bowed down before the Lamb, and bowls of incense symbolizing the prayers of many all over the earth were seen. This scene was the culminating time that the Apostle John had awaited. I'm sure he now wept again for the joy of the moment. Many of us, I believe, will also see this scene in heaven, if we should leave this earth before the coming of the Lord, roaring like a lion in great power and glory. The Lamb Exalted 11"Then I looked, and I heard the voices of many angels and living creatures and elders encircling the throne, and their number was myriads of myriads and thousands of thousands. 12In a loud voice they said: ​ 'Worthy is the Lamb who was slain, to receive power and riches and wisdom and strength and honor and glory and blessing!' ​ 13"And I heard every creature in heaven, and on earth, and under the earth, and in the sea, and all that is in them, saying: ​ 'To Him who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb, be praise and honor and glory and power forever and ever!' ​ 14"And the four living creatures said, "Amen," and the elders fell down and worshiped" (Revelation 5:11-14). At the sight of the Lord taking the scroll into His hands, John is likely overcome with emotion, just as each of us will be if we are in heaven at the time. Remember, all that he is viewing is what must be hereafter (Revelation 4:1). The time will come when Jesus will come, and how ecstatic will be those whose lives have been bought by Him. We see many angels proclaiming and singing. We see the living creatures around the throne, the twenty-four elders, as well as many angels, myriads of myriads, and thousands of thousands, loudly giving praise to God. On top of that, John then hears every creature that has been longing for deliverance, in heaven, in the sea, and yes, even under the earth—all crying out to the Lord in worship, praise, and adoration. What a great day that will be! Hallelujah! While we wait for our King to come, what should we be doing in the meantime? How shall we now pray? Does this alter your perspective of God's judgment as a positive concept? Prayer. Lord, we see the nations in chaos, and our world struggling with gross injustice, cruelty, and pain. What a glorious day it will be when You arise in power to triumph over the enemy of our souls and bring salvation, i.e., wholeness to your creation once again. Make us ready, our hearts soft and open to you, our eyes looking to You in faith, while we proclaim, "Come Lord Jesus!"

Study - 6

6. The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse Revelation 6:1-8 Is the Breaking of the Seals the Wrath of God? As Christians, when we read of the future, we sometimes forget that God is sovereign over the affairs of men, which means that He knows everything and that nothing happens to us outside of God's permissive will and control. Not all that happens to us is God-initiated, however. We don't have to look far in our world to see that evil sometimes reigns, seemingly unchecked by God. The Lord permits some things, but only for a time. He intervenes in answer to prayer. Think of the story of Exodus. God's people were in slavery to Egypt until they began to cry out to the Lord (Exodus 2:23-25). Although the things we read about in this book can sometimes seem frightening, we must remember that we are eternal creatures and that this life is not the end. Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are not the only things to pursue. As believers, earthly things alone will never fulfill us. We are strangers and pilgrims in this world (Hebrews 11:13), and we are being trained and prepared for the next. As we come to chapter six of the Book of Revelation, the scene carries on from the last chapter where John the Apostle saw the Lord Jesus taking the seven-sealed scroll from the hand of the Father. In chapters six through eleven, we read through chronological events, followed by chapters twelve through twenty-two going over specific incidents that take place during the end times. This chronological outline of the main events is also reflected in Jesus' talk on the end times in Matthew 24:3-31. With the breaking of each of the first four seals, we see a horseman going forth with an effect upon the earth. The Word of God never says that the first six seals are the wrath of God poured out. It is an assumption by some in the Body of Christ, based on faulty thinking that the Tribulation is the wrath of God and lasts for seven years. Even though we see the heavenly living creatures giving the orders; "Come!", this writer does not believe the effects are the wrath of God, but rather the world system sowing to the wind, now reaping the whirlwind (Hosea 8:7). The effects on earth by the four horsemen of the apocalypse are events that happen to saint and sinner alike. The enemy only has power against the Church because the Lord allows him. In the below passage of scripture, the words "it was given" are recorded twice. "It was given power to wage war against God's holy people and to conquer them. And it was given authority over every tribe, people, language and nation" (Revelation 13:7). It is a possibility that the word it, used twice in the verse above, could refer to artificial intelligence, for somebody gives power to something which is referred to as an "it", a "thing", not giving any gender or person reference. Having mentioned artificial intelligence, this writer believes that the Antichrist will use artificial intelligence to control the world through a system of IoT (Internet of Things). The judgment and wrath of God come at the breaking of the seventh seal and the opening of the scroll, that's why chapter 8:1 says a half-hour silence takes place as the scroll is about to be opened. It is only at the seventh seal that God steps on to the stage of world events to rapture the believers and the wrath of God is poured out on those who have chosen to take the Mark of the Beast and worship the Antichrist. Let's now explore what effects take place at the opening of each seal: The First Seal 1I watched as the Lamb opened the first of the seven seals. Then I heard one of the four living creatures say in a voice like thunder, "Come!" 2I looked, and there before me was a white horse! Its rider held a bow, and he was given a crown, and he rode out as a conqueror bent on conquest (Revelation 6:1-2). As we work through the seals, you will notice that the effects of the breaking of the seven seals are almost exactly the same as what Jesus said would happen in his talk with the twelve disciples on the Mount of Olives, known as the Olivet Discourse (Matthew 24). Christ's talk with the disciples was an outline of the main events; whereas, the Book of Revelation fills in more of the details. It might be helpful for you to have the ribbon of your Bible or one finger in Matthew 24 and another in Revelation chapter 6. When the first seal is broken, a rider goes forth on a white horse, and he carries a bow, but there is no mention of arrows. The Old Testament pictures the bow as a sign of military power: "In that day I will break Israel's bow in the Valley of Jezreel" (Hosea 1:5; also Jeremiah 51:56). The rider on the white horse has great military power, "Who is like the beast? Who can wage war against it?" (Revelation 13:4), and is also given a crown, and he rides out as a conqueror bent on conquest. The crown he wears is a Stephanos, the victors crown; whereas, the crowns upon the head of Christ in Revelation 19:12 is Diadema, i.e. the royal crown and the crown of authority. This rider on a white horse in Revelation 6 is a picture of the Antichrist who will deceive the world into believing him to be a savior. He will mimic Christ, who will also be riding a white horse at His coming (Revelation 19:12). The symbolism of the rider being a conqueror, but having no arrows makes us think that the Antichrist will be a peacemaker. He will make himself out to be a savior, Messiah, and a god, conquering through deception by claiming to solve the problems of the world. His mask will come off later as he brings about war, the second horseman of the apocalypse. In a passage in the Book of Daniel (Daniel 8:25), the prophet gave a warning about the antichrist. This reference could also refer to Antiochus IV Epiphanes, as a type of foreshadowing. Many Bible historians believe this. You can research what this man Antiochus IV Epiphanes did, but for right now I want to focus on the actions of the Antichrist as he appears on the scene. We often see in scripture how an event or person can be a "preview" or foreshadowing of a significant event. In this case, Antiochus IV Epiphanes was a "preview" of what the Antichrist will be and what actions he will take. Here's what this man will do: He will cause deceit to prosper, and he will consider himself superior. When they feel secure, he will destroy many and take his stand against the Prince of princes. Yet he will be destroyed, but not by human power (Daniel 8:25). The Prince of princes can only be the Messiah, and that is not something the historical Antiochus IV did in 167 B.C. The Antichrist will make a peace treaty over the issue of who owns Jerusalem, which the prophet Daniel says will start a seven-year period (Daniel 9:27, the 70th week of Daniel). The Jewish people say that Jerusalem is the eternal capital of the Jewish nation, whereas the Palestinians want the eastern half of it (The pre-1967 border). The Temple Mount, where the Jewish Temple once stood, is managed by a Muslim trust since 1187 when the Muslims regained the Temple Mount from the Crusaders. There has been a spiritual struggle for many years as to the ownership of the city of Jerusalem. In fact, the prophetic scriptures say that Jerusalem will be a heavy burden for politicians and world leaders to solve right up to the very end when the Lord comes: On that day, when all the nations of the earth are gathered against her, I will make Jerusalem an immovable rock for all the nations. All who try to move it will injure themselves (Zechariah 12:3). In Matthew 24, the disciples asked Jesus, "What will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age?" As we said at the beginning of this study, Matthew 24:3-31 is chronological, with verses 32 through to the end of chapter 25 having specific teaching about how to live during the end-time. When Jesus was asked what would be the sign of His coming and the end of the age, He replied: 4Jesus answered: "Watch out that no one deceives you. 5For many will come in my name, claiming, 'I am the Christ,' and will deceive many (Matthew 24:4-5). How has the world seen this phenomenon already? Can you recall the names of people claiming to be a "messiah" or "anointed one"? Are there recent instances of this in your lifetime, large or small? The first thing Jesus talked about concerning the signs of the times is that a high level of deception would be at work in the world. How true is that of the days that we are living in? Both sides of the divide in America are saying the other is engaging in "Fake News." There are so many voices, and people do not know what or who to believe. Can you see that the stage is set for someone to come and provide answers and leadership in a crisis situation? People everywhere are longing for the truth and seeking for answers. The Antichrist will provide what the people are clamoring for. Leading up to and into the seventieth week of Daniel, the world will see some people claiming that they are the Christ, the anointed one. The final manifestation of this will be that the Antichrist himself will come using lies and deceit and claiming that he is the Christ, the one for whom the world has been waiting to bring peace and salvation! He will overcome nations and come to rule over a ten-nation confederacy of ten regions of the earth (Daniel 7:23-24). Jesus said to the Jewish people, "I have come in my Father's name, and you do not accept me; but if someone else comes in his own name, you will accept him" (John 5:43). If this passage does refer to Antichrist, it is possible that the nation of Israel will buy into Antichrist's lies and that he will be the guarantor of a peace covenant that will see the Temple rebuilt in Jerusalem. Antichrist will be believed and received as their savior until he proclaims himself as God and sets himself up as God in the Temple in the middle point of the seven-year period (2 Thessalonians 2:4; Daniel 9:27). It's interesting to think that Islam is also expecting a great prophet to arrive. They call him the Twelfth Imam or the Mahdi. My personal belief is that the Antichrist will not be a Muslim; if he were, the Jewish people would never accept him as their messiah. The Second Seal 3When the Lamb opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature say, "Come!" 4Then another horse came out, a fiery red one. Its rider was given power to take peace from the earth and to make people kill each other. To him was given a large sword (Revelation 6:3-4). The breaking of the second seal brings a second horse (v. 4). This scripture is talking about war. This man of peace, the Antichrist, after he takes power, will bring about a series of conflicts. Flip back to the book of Matthew and read Jesus' teaching His disciples on the Mount of Olives: 6You will hear of wars and rumors of wars, but see to it that you are not alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come. 7Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom (Matthew 24:6-7). This conflict may be a war that starts when Antichrist gains leadership of a ten-nation confederacy that brings the whole world under his control. Daniel prophesied of three nations or leaders brought into subjugation to him (Daniel 7:24). There is likely more than one war that takes place, for we read of wars (plural) and rumors of wars. It may also be the time when a nation situated to the far north of Israel will launch an attack on Israel (Ezekiel 38-39). Most commentators believe this nation to be Russia, allied with Persia (Iran), Libya and Turkey, and other countries, an attack that has not yet happened (Ezekiel 38:1-15, and 39:2). This attack occurs after a re-gathering of Jewish people from all nations back to the land of Israel (Ezekiel 38:7-9), an event happening in our day. There is no other day in history before the creation of the state of Israel in 1948 when this could be fulfilled so perfectly. God has been gathering the people of Israel back to their land, which is another sign of the last days. We can see how the scene is set in our day for events that the Scriptures tell us are yet to come. Let's turn now to the breaking of the third seal: The Third Seal 5When the Lamb opened the third seal; I heard the third living creature say, "Come!" I looked, and there before me was a black horse! Its rider was holding a pair of scales in his hand. 6Then I heard what sounded like a voice among the four living creatures, saying, "A quart of wheat for a day's wages, and three quarts of barley for a day's wages, and do not damage the oil and the wine!" (Revelation 6:5-6). The result of the wars at the beginning of the seven-year period, the seventieth week of Daniel, is that famine begins to take hold on the earth. How will this happen? This lack of food could be the result of nuclear weapon fallout spreading over fields and destroying crops. It could also be the consequences of globalist control of food and raising the prices to manipulate and control countries dependent on the Antichrist's food supply and grain. The famine might also be the result of using the control of food to force people to take the Mark of the Beast. 16It also forced all people, great and small, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hands or on their foreheads, 17so that they could not buy or sell unless they had the mark, which is the name of the beast or the number of its name (Revelation 13:16-17). Whatever the cause, a day's wage will only manage to buy enough food for the day for a small family. The pair of scales represents food being weighed and rationed. Barley was usually fed to animals and is low in nutrients, hence the lower price. In the Olivet discourse, too, Matthew records Jesus saying that famines will follow the wars. He also adds that there will be earthquakes as well: 7There will be famines and earthquakes in various places. 8All these are the beginning of birth pains (Matthew 24:7-8). What are your thoughts about Jesus' words that this is just the beginning stages of the birth pains? What was the Lord implying by using the analogy of birth pains? Think of how birth pains progress. When talking about wars, Jesus said that "Such things must happen, but the end is still to come" (Matthew 24:6). He is letting us know that we are only in the beginning stages of what will happen. Christ called these preceding years the beginning birth pains, likening the first three and a half years to the birth of a baby (v. 8). As the earth gets closer to the coming of Christ, it is in the throes of hard labor. As in the birth of a baby, the destructive events are typical of hard labor with more painful contractions and each labor pain taking place one after the other in rapid succession. The Fourth Seal 7When the Lamb opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth living creature say, "Come!" 8I looked, and there before me was a pale horse! Its rider was named Death, and Hades was following close behind him. They were given power over a fourth of the earth to kill by sword, famine, and plague, and by the wild beasts of the earth (Revelation 6:7-8). When the fourth seal is opened, we see that four different things acting together wipe out a quarter of earth's population which is currently at 7.4 billion people (2020), estimated to be eight billion in 2024. The four things causing death on a massive scale are sword, famine, pestilence or plague, and the wild beasts of the earth accompanied by persecution. The color of the fourth seal pale horse mentioned is significant. The Greek word for the color of the coat is chloros, from where we get such English words as chlorine, chloroform, and chlorophyll. The term describes a greenish-yellow color that is characteristic of a decomposing corpse. The horse's rider is named Death and permission is given ("They were given power," v. 8) for a fourth of the population of the earth to be killed by sword, famine, plague, and by wild beasts. The rider on the back of the horse is named as "death," which is another unique characteristic as it is the only rider that is named. The Greek word translated into English is the common word for death, thánatos, but this term could also be meant as death through pestilence or disease, for when Jesus described the things that preceded His coming, He said, "And there will be famines [third seal or horseman], pestilences [fourth seal or horseman], and earthquakes in various places" (Matthew 24:7). Matthew did not use the Greek word thánatos but loimós, the word translated as disease or pestilence. This fourth horse and rider bring death by pestilence or plague. Let's think about each mentioned as happening at the fourth seal. First of all, the passage states that some are killed by the sword (v. 8). We should not take that to mean that battles are going to be fought with swords; the sword speaks of death through violent means. Killed by sword sounds like a level of violence going on with people killing one another, perhaps because of a breakdown of civil order due to lack of food. There are those who have openly proposed a plan of intentional de-population, citing an ideal number of half a billion people. (See for research, the Georgia Guide Stones). The famine started at the third seal is also continuing, and plague also adds to the death of a quarter of the population. What could the epidemic be? Is this a further virus that breaks out on the earth? What would happen if a more virulent pestilence or plague were to come? Martial law would be declared in an attempt to contain the spread. Truckers would not want to go into affected areas, thus causing the famine to be worse. Our passage in Revelation also talks about people killed by wild beasts. How can that be possible in our day? In the Old Testament, God warned Israel that if they were unfaithful to Him, He would release four categories of death upon them, i.e., 21"my four dreadful judgments—sword and famine and wild beasts and plague—to kill its men and their animals!" (Ezekiel 14:13-21). How many wild beasts are left on planet earth even at present? I suggest another interpretation of this word. The Greek word used is thēriόn, and although it is mostly used for animals, it could also be indicative of people who have let their inner beast nature dominate their lives to such a degree that they behave like wild beasts. When people dominated by selfish greed or hunger find themselves backed into a corner, they will act in a predatory way, out of a beast-like need for preservation, especially in a time of famine when men find it difficult to feed their families. Consider the two Scriptures below that speak of men behaving like beasts: I am in the midst of lions; I lie among ravenous beasts— men whose teeth are spears and arrows, whose tongues are sharp swords (Psalm 57:4). But these men blaspheme in matters they do not understand. They are like brute beasts, creatures of instinct, born only to be caught and destroyed, and like beasts, they too will perish (2 Peter 2:12). Jesus also talked about what happens on earth at the time of the fourth seal. Turn again to Matthew's Gospel: 9"Then you will be handed over to be persecuted and put to death, and you will be hated by all nations because of me. 10At that time many will turn away from the faith and will betray and hate each other, 11and many false prophets will appear and deceive many people. 12Because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow cold, 13but he who stands firm to the end will be saved [sōthēsetai translated saved here has a number of meanings, one of which is to be physically delivered]. 14And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come (Matthew 24:9-14). In the passage above, Jesus said that in the last days, persecution would break out because of Christ. Is this a persecution of Jews, Messianic Jews, or is it believers in Christ all over the world? Jesus also prophesied that wickedness will increase (v. 12) and that the love of many will grow cold. What will cause wickedness to increase and the love of many to grow cold? (v. 12). What causes such things, and how is it creeping into our culture today? Men betraying each other (v.10) sounds like individuals who are inwardly depraved and giving full vent to the beast side of their nature, persecuting anyone who will not go along with Antichrist's mark and his rule and reign. The Lord delivers His people out of the time of great persecution by snatching them up and out of it (v.13). The Lord spoke of a time when all nations will hate true Bible believers for their stand for Christ (v. 9). This persecution of the saints will result in a mighty outpouring of the Spirit, I believe, that will bring about a great harvest of people saved as the gospel is proclaimed in power. Jesus spoke of a mighty revival move of the Spirit throughout the world in verse 14 that bring many to Christ. We can look at the opening of the seals as a terrifying time, but I believe many will come to Christ when they hear of the reality of Christ's miraculous work among the Church, healing and protecting His people in a multitude of ways. Expect God to work wonders at this time when the seals are being broken. The enemy will not have everything his way. There will be a time when those who are followers of Christ will see the enemy's deception at work in the world. The Church of the day will be powerful and entirely reliant on the Spirit. They will do exploits by the power of the Spirit of God: And such as do wickedly against the covenant shall he [The Antichrist] corrupt by flatteries: but the people that do know their God shall be strong, and do exploits (Daniel 11:32 KJV). With flattery he [The Antichrist] will corrupt those who have violated the covenant, but the people who know their God will firmly resist him (Daniel 11:32 NIV). What does it mean to resist the enemy? Are you doing this day by day? I would encourage you to ask yourself this question. Do not wait to learn this important lesson. As the days get darker, we who are Christ-followers are to shine brighter. We are told that the spirit of Antichrist is already in the world! (1 John 4:3). Do you recognize it? What is your response to this spirit in your everyday life? We need to open our eyes to the deceptions of the enemy. Media is a strong influencer. Be mindful of what you see, hear, and say. This is a day when we need to align ourselves with our King, Jesus. His Kingdom will never pass away. His reign will endure and we are being prepared as the Bride of Christ to be with Him. Do not sleep, but be ready and let your heart attitude and prayer be: "Come Lord Jesus!" Prayer: "Our prayer today, Father, is for You to mold us and shape us to be strong in Your Power. Open up our eyes so that we can clearly see the spiritual warfare that is taking place. Awaken hearts everywhere and open the eyes of the blind to see You. We give our allegiance to the King of Kings! We await Your wonderful coming, when all will be revealed and we will see You in your glory, as You really are." Keith Thomas Website: www.groupbiblestudy.com Email: [email protected]

Study - 2

2. Letters to Three Churches Revelation 2:1-17 We come now to the first three of seven letters the Lord instructed John the apostle to write to the seven churches in the province of Asia. Some scholars believe that each church represents different periods in church history, starting with the church of Ephesus representing the first epoch and the seventh church, Laodicea, being the present time before the coming of the Lord. There are problems with that interpretation, though, one being that we have no indication of the cut off period for each period of church history. Also, if we believe that view, that makes the first six churches not applicable to us today. It is this writer's view that what John wrote down were actual situations in different churches at the time of the Revelation, and that the corrections and affirmations of each church have lessons relevant to churches and believers throughout the world today: "Write therefore the things that you have seen, those that are and those that are to take place after this (Revelation 1:19). Like a performance review, all believers today are to examine ourselves from the words given to the seven churches. Why These Seven Churches? At the time of his banishment and revelation on the island of Patmos, John the apostle had been a leader at the church in Ephesus, with some scholars suggesting that as an apostle, he had some level of responsibility to the other six churches. It was the apostle Paul who spent three years planting and growing the church at Ephesus more than forty years earlier (Acts 20:31), and as an equipper of the saints, much of his ministry was in training and sending others out from there to plant other churches in the smaller towns. Some scholars suggest that the seven churches were on a postal route and that each of the seven churches was responsible for getting the letter to other churches, such as Hierapolis and Colossae, churches not on the postal road. Pergamum was the official capital of the province of Asia, but Ephesus was by far its most magnificent city, and was called the "first and greatest metropolis of Asia."[1] In Ephesus was the great temple of Artemis, one of the seven wonders of the ancient world with the image of Artemis, the black many breasted figure that people came from far and wide to worship. As well as being a center of worship, the temple was a center of crime and immorality due to having the right of asylum; any criminal was safe if he could reach it. Along with so many criminals, the temple also had hundreds of priestesses who were sacred prostitutes.[2] Paul was undoubtedly courageous to plant a church among so much evil, and it was his protégé, Timothy, that took over leadership for a time (1 Timothy 1:3). Aquila, Priscilla and Apollos also served the church (Acts 18:19, 24, 26). God did many wonderful miracles amid such darkness, so much so that it stirred up demonic powers to motivate Demetrius, the silversmith, to cause a riot of several thousand people (Acts 19:24-41). Whenever God moves in great grace in a city or a life, the enemy will always try to oppose the work. We should expect opposition. Now more than thirty years after the church was planted, John the apostle had a message to the believers in Ephesus: To the Church in Ephesus 1To the angel of the church in Ephesus write: These are the words of him who holds the seven stars in his right hand and walks among the seven golden lampstands. 2I know your deeds, your hard work and your perseverance. I know that you cannot tolerate wicked people, that you have tested those who claim to be apostles but are not, and have found them false. 3You have persevered and have endured hardships for my name, and have not grown weary. 4Yet I hold this against you: You have forsaken the love you had at first. 5Consider how far you have fallen! Repent and do the things you did at first. If you do not repent, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place. 6But you have this in your favor: You hate the practices of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate. 7Whoever has ears, let them hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To the one who is victorious, I will give the right to eat from the tree of life, which is in the paradise of God (Revelation 2:1-7). John was told to write to seven angels, the first being the angel at Ephesus. The Lord said that He holds the seven stars in His right hand. To hold is the Greek word, kratein, and means a strong grasp rather than just a slight grip with the fingers. It reminds us of Jesus' words, "I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one will snatch them out of my hand" (John 10:28). Even though the church is in the midst of wolves, the Lord is well able to keep those committed to Him and not let them go. In the ancient world, it was believed that each person had a guardian angel (Hebrews 1:14, Matthew 18:10). When Peter was released from jail by an angel, he went to a home meeting where people were praying for him. When the people were told that Peter was at the door, they said that it had to be his angel (Acts 14:12-15), perhaps they thought that he had died and his angel came to let them know. The Scriptures record Michael, the archangel, being the protector of the nation of Israel (Daniel 10:13, 20-21), so if individuals and countries had angels watching over them, it is possible that each church also has angelic protection. There are two places in the Scriptures where the Greek word angelos, customarily translated as angels, was spoken of as human messengers (Matthew 11:7-10, Luke 9:52). It could be that the seven angels were the primary human messengers that had the responsibility for the teaching and oversight of the churches, often called the senior pastor in many larger churches today. It could also be that the angel or messenger referred to the corporate body of the church. The Lord said that He knew their deeds, their hard work, and their perseverance. It is a precious thing that all labor of love for Christ is seen by Him and not forgotten and will be rewarded when the end of the age comes, and Jesus sits on His throne. In a day in which it is pressed upon us to be tolerant of others, in this letter, the Lord affirmed the church for not being tolerant of wickedness and those who claim they came with the Lord's authority but when the Ephesian church put them to the test, they found them false. How are leaders tested? We look for the fruit of the Spirit in their lives. Do they exhibit love, joy, peace, etc.? (Galatians 5:22-24). The Lord then pointed out an area of correction to them; they had forsaken the love they had at first (v. 4). If you are married or have been in a romance, what were the early expressions of love you showed to your loved one? What three things was the Lord commanding the Ephesian church to do to halt the slide of their failure to love Him as they did at first? First, He told them to consider their lives before and compare where they were at present (v. 5). Many of us can remember the early days of our romance with our spouses, the expressions of our love that we no longer practice. The Lord here is yearning for that pure romance of when we first fell in love with Him—the expressions of love and obedience we once had to Him. Secondly, he instructs us to repent, change our minds and live our lives in obedience and love to Christ. The third thing is for us to express our love to Him in ways that we did at first. He warns this church, and perhaps us, too, that if we don't turn the direction of our lives, the light that used to shine from us will be removed, and we will descend into doing things by rote and without the heart. We will be just going through the motions. The brightness of the testimony of our lamps will grow dim. Christ then affirmed them for their hatred of the practices of the Nicolaitans, not the hatred of the people but what they were doing. Who were the Nicolaitans? The Greek word is comprised of two words, nico meaning conquest over others, and the second part, lai, means people. The last part, tes, represents the word "the." Nicolaitans are defined as those who conquer or rule over people. Even in those days, and indeed today, too, there are some religious leaders who put themselves higher than the people they serve, but let us remember Jesus' teaching that leaders are but greater servants (Matthew 20:26, Mark 9:355), and should not be put on a pedestal. 8But you are not to be called 'Rabbi,' for you have one Teacher, and you are all brothers. 9And do not call anyone on earth 'father,' for you have one Father, and he is in heaven. 10Nor are you to be called instructors, for you have one Instructor, the Messiah. 11The greatest among you will be your servant (Matthew 23:8-11). Jesus said we are brothers (v. 8), not bosses and servants, nor even father and children, no, we are all on the same level as equals. The greatest leaders are the greatest servants, the ones willing to do the dirty work. Let's now look at the letter to the church at Smyrna. To the Church in Smyrna 8To the angel of the church in Smyrna write: These are the words of him who is the First and the Last, who died and came to life again. 9I know your afflictions and your poverty—yet you are rich! I know about the slander of those who say they are Jews and are not, but are a synagogue of Satan. 10Do not be afraid of what you are about to suffer. I tell you, the devil will put some of you in prison to test you, and you will suffer persecution for ten days. Be faithful, even to the point of death, and I will give you life as your victor's crown. 11Whoever has ears, let them hear what the Spirit says to the churches. The one who is victorious will not be hurt at all by the second death (Revelation 2:8-11). In the second letter, the Lord refers back to what we read in the first chapter, that He is the First and the Last, the One who died and came to life again (Revelation 1:17). In fact, in each of the seven letters except the last, there are names of Jesus that are also in the first chapter. The Lord says that He knew their afflictions. The Greek word is the word generally translated as tribulation, but here translated as affliction. The word means to be crushed under a weight; such was the affliction and persecution the believers at Ephesus were enduring due to the Roman emperor Domitian demanding that believers at least once a year, burn incense to Domitian, and confess that Caesar was god. It is likely that because of refusing to confess Domitian as god, they were enduring poverty because of their stand. Perhaps they were being singled out of commercial opportunities in the city because of their desire to be separate and a holy people. Jesus sees differently than this world system. To Him, they were rich in faith. The Jewish community had managed to get a pass on this once a year act of devotion to Caesar, but they stirred up the civil authorities against the Christians, believing the Christians to have departed from the Law of God. The Lord said that they were the ones who had departed from God and become a synagogue, an assembly, of Satan. The enemy was at work against the believers in Christ by using the Jewish community. The Lord warned them against a further time of persecution of believers in Smyrna, saying that some would be put into prison for a time of testing (v. 10). Some would say that believers won't have to go through tribulation, but in this passage the Lord was letting them know ahead of time that they would endure suffering, persecution and testing (v. 10). Why would God allow a time of testing to believers? What does testing mean, and what are the benefits for being tested? We get the English word test from the making of swords or plowshares; the test was to put the sword through the fire and harden it by hammering the steel on an anvil to strengthen it. The word came to mean a procedure for critical evaluation, a means of determining the presence, quality, or truth of something; a trial.[3] We should not take the mention of ten days at face value, for it was used to describe a short period of testing. Times of great stress or even war where a person's life is threatened cause us to lean deeply on God and those closest to us in troubling times. This kind of stress creates deep bonding relationships, and for churches who go through trials it creates deep bonds between believers. Like them, we may also endure persecution for Christ, and we are to be faithful even to death, for the Lord's promise is the crown of the victor or overcomer. Those who are victorious over this world, and Satan's world system, will not be hurt by the second death. Those who will be hurt by the second death speaks of all those who refuse God's offer of a free pardon for their sins. They will be judged at the Great White Throne judgment and cast into the Lake of Fire (Revelation 20:12-15). Believers in Christ have eternal life and will not be at this judgment. Let's now turn our attention to the letter to Pergamum. To the Church in Pergamum 12To the angel of the church in Pergamum write: These are the words of him who has the sharp, double-edged sword. 13I know where you live—where Satan has his throne. Yet you remain true to my name. You did not renounce your faith in me, not even in the days of Antipas, my faithful witness, who was put to death in your city—where Satan lives. 14Nevertheless, I have a few things against you: There are some among you who hold to the teaching of Balaam, who taught Balak to entice the Israelites to sin so that they ate food sacrificed to idols and committed sexual immorality. 15Likewise, you also have those who hold to the teaching of the Nicolaitans.16Repent therefore! Otherwise, I will soon come to you and will fight against them with the sword of my mouth. 17Whoever has ears, let them hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To the one who is victorious, I will give some of the hidden manna. I will also give that person a white stone with a new name written on it, known only to the one who receives it (Revelation 2:12-17). Again, we hear of Jesus' complete knowledge of all the things the church was enduring for Christ. What does it mean that Satan had his throne there? (v. 13). This city had a temple to Zeus along with an altar and steps thirty foot high. This altar was possibly the seat of Satan mentioned (v. 13). The altar of Zeus at Pergamum, where Satan had his throne, was excavated and brought stone by stone to Germany in the early 1900s. It is an interesting side thought that Adolf Hitler had his chief architect, Albert Speer, create stairs and an altar similar to the Altar of Zeus and Hitler came down the stairs of the altar of Pergamum as a savior to Germany on to the parade grounds of Nuremberg, bewitching Germany with occult power to deceive that nation. The stairs and the altar of Pergamum is now at Berlin's Museum Island.[4] There was also a temple devoted to the worship of the god Asclepios, the god of healing. The emblem of Asclepios was the serpent on a pole. In the Old Testament, when the Israelites were 40 years in the desert, they encountered poisonous snakes that killed many of them. When they cried out to the Lord, He instructed them to set up a bronze snake on a pole, and whoever looked to the bronze snake was healed (Numbers 21: 9). Jesus used the picture as an example of Himself being lifted on a cross for us to be healed of the poison of sin (John 3:14-15). Satan, "that ancient serpent, who is the devil, or Satan" (Revelation 20:2), took this image of sin being judged and twisted the meaning for people to look to the false god Asclepios. People came to Pergamum from all over the known world to be healed of their sicknesses. Patients would approach the healing temple via the Sacred Way, a path into the temple that led to an underground passage wherein were cubicles where patients slept lying on the floor among non-venomous snakes. If the snake touched their bodies, they were said to be healed by Asclepios.[5] Satan, our invisible enemy, tries to mimic our God and seeks to be worshiped as God (2 Thessalonians 2:4). The most common name for this false god was Asclepios Sótér, Asclepios, the Savior. What an abomination it is to the believer in Christ for this demon to be called savior! There is only one Savior, and His name is Jesus. Yet all over the world, a universal symbol for healing is the false god Asclepios on a pole. What two things was the Lord seeking to correct in the church of Pergamum? The Lord then spoke some words of correction to the church, saying that there were some there who hold to the teaching of Balaam, who, when God would not allow Balaam to curse Israel on behalf of Balak, the ruler of the country of Moab, he taught the women of Moab how to seduce the men of Israel and influence them to worship false gods (Numbers 22-24, Numbers 31:16). The apostle Peter wrote about the error of Balaam, saying, "They have left the straight way and wandered off to follow the way of Balaam son of Bezer, who loved the wages of wickedness" (2 Peter 2:15). When Balaam could not get paid for cursing Israel, he turned to sinful methods to be paid. Balaam knew that God would discipline the Israelites if he could lure them into immoral sex and idolatry. We get on the opposite side of the Lord if leaders begin to manipulate the flock of God for higher remuneration and teach for financial reward. The Lord calls His church to repentance from such things. He also rebuked the church at Pergamum for holding the doctrine of the Nicolaitans, the practices of which were hated by the church of Ephesus. What the Ephesian believers hated (2:6), the believers at Pergamum were led into compromising their faith. We must be aware of the dangers of the things we compromise about. The believers in Pergamum, rather than go through persecution, saved themselves from persecution by bowing to the idols. "Compromise is like dry rot in the fabric of the Christian church; sooner or later the structure will give way" (Mary S Wood).[6] It is perhaps the greatest sin of the greatest number of Christians that in so many details of life they put God second. We are to be separate from this world system and hold fast to the Lord Jesus under the trial or test. "Whoever has ears, let them hear what the Spirit says to the churches" (v. 17). Keith Thomas Email: [email protected] Website: www.groupbiblestudy.com All scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version, Copyright Ó 1973, 1978, 1984 by Biblica, Inc.Ô Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.

Study - 1

1. The Vision of the Son of Man Revelation 1 ​ A survey was taken among church attendees as to what book of the Bible would they most like taught. Most people chose the Book of Revelation, which then prompted them to also do a survey among the pastors of churches as to what book of the Bible they avoided teaching the most, again it was the Book of Revelation. This writer has waited forty-two years to teach passage by passage through this book. It is a godly fearful thing to put words into print about this particular book, because the Lord gives a warning to writers and teachers of the Book of Revelation: 18I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: if anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book, 19and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away his share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book (Revelation 22:18-19). Of course, most teachers of Revelation have no intention of taking away the words, they just don't want to misinterpret it. As I have traveled through 32 different nations on five continents, I have become aware of how little is the amount of literature and teaching material on Bible topics that many nations have. My intent in writing, therefore, is to reach out to the nations of the world that cannot access many of the commentaries, books, and study guides we have in the West. I dedicate my work to them with my prayer that God's Word will bring much fruit. Introduction Most scholars believe that the author, John (v. 9), is the same John who wrote the Gospel of John and the three epistles or letters that bear his name in the New Testament. Some people call this book, the book of Revelations, plural, but the Greek word, apokálypsis, translated as Revelation (v. 1), means uncovering or unveiling. The word is not plural, but it is in the singular voice and could be translated as The Book of the Unveiling. Perhaps we can liken it to Michelangelo chipping away his statue of David under a veil, so the Holy Spirit wants to remove the covers and reveal the Lord Jesus as He really is and for His church to know God's plan and purpose for the earth. Some people are scared to read this book because of some of the fearful things within its pages. Others look at the book and find it difficult to understand because of the symbolic pictures, but God wants His people to understand the prophecy. He said, "Do not seal up the words of the prophecy of this book, for the time is near" (Revelation 22:10). More than five hundred years before Christ, the prophet Daniel was told that one of his prophecies would not be understood until the end times: "but seal up the vision, for it concerns the distant future" (Daniel 8:26), but in our day most students of biblical prophecy agree that the end-times are upon us and God is opening His people's minds to the person of Christ and the unveiling of His purpose for this world. Let's look at the first three verses and then continue our introduction of the book: ​ 1The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show to his servants the things that must soon take place. He made it known by sending his angel to his servant John, 2who bore witness to the word of God and to the testimony of Jesus Christ, even to all that he saw. 3Blessed is the one who reads aloud the words of this prophecy, and blessed are those who hear, and who keep what is written in it, for the time is near (Revelation 1:1-3). ​ The passage above points out that the purpose of this book is that God wants His people to know the things that must soon take place (v. 1) and guarantees a blessing to all who read aloud and who hears it and puts into practice the words of this book (v. 3). It is an important book for all believers to read because the Lord stated a blessing also at the end of the book: "Look, I am coming soon! Blessed is the one who keeps the words of the prophecy written in this scroll" (Revelation 22:7). I would encourage us, therefore, to obtain the blessing by finding time to read aloud through the prophecy of this book. One of the reasons people have a hard time understanding this book is that there are many allusions, intimations, or typology to the Old Testament, and, unfortunately, many Christians do not give time to reading the Old Testament. For instance, what we read about in the beginning in Genesis ends in Revelation. The book of Genesis has the beginning of heaven and earth, in Revelation the realization or fulfillment of heaven and earth. In Genesis, we read of the entrance of sin and the curse, in Revelation we have the end of sin and the curse (Revelation 22:3). In Genesis we see God's enemy, Satan, disrupting God's people, and the earth, in Revelation we have the destruction of Satan (Revelation 20:2, 10). In Genesis, we see a departure from the Tree of Life (Genesis 3:23), in Revelation the Tree of Life is regained (Revelation 22:2-3). In Genesis, death comes on the scene, but in Revelation there is no more death: "He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away" (Revelation 21:4 emphasis mine). In Genesis sorrow and pain enters, and in Revelation crying and pain are banished (Revelation 21:4). In Genesis Paradise is lost, but in Revelation Paradise is regained (Revelation 21:10). In Genesis, a Savior is promised (Genesis 3:15), while in Revelation that Savior, Messiah, will walk with us and, "They will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads" (Revelation 22:4). The Book of Revelation is the climax of all the longings of mankind. Outline We have an outline that John himself gives us in the first chapter: Write therefore the things that you have seen, those that are and those that are to take place after this (Revelation 1:19). We have a prologue (1:1-8), then "the things that you have seen," past tense, refer to the vision of the Lord Jesus in all His glory in chapter one, verses 9-18. "Those that are" refer to the Lord's corrections and admonitions of the seven churches in chapters 2-3. The reference to "those that are to take place after this," refers to chapters 4-21, the things that are soon to take place, i.e., the prophetic events that culminate in the return of Christ and the setting up of His kingdom, and God's judgment of sin. Then finally there is an epilogue in chapter 22. ​ Other things that are helpful to know as we study this book, is that the writer, John the apostle, is commonly estimated to be 92 years old at the time of the writing of Revelation and was one of a team of leaders at the church at Ephesus, one of the seven churches in the province of Asia, and perhaps had some sort of oversight over the other six churches mentioned, being all in the same area of what is now Southwest Turkey. The place where John writes from was the island of Patmos, an island 30 miles off the main coastline of what is now the country of Turkey. According to the historian Eusebius, John was banished there by the Roman emperor Domitian in the year AD 95 for refusing to worship Domitian as a god. He was released eighteen months later by the emperor Nerva after Domitian was assassinated. The time of the writing is estimated to be A.D. 96, a time when many of the churches were going through persecution by the Romans. ​ Greeting to the Seven Churches ​ 4John to the seven churches that are in Asia: Grace to you and peace from him who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven spirits who are before his throne, 5and from Jesus Christ the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of kings on earth. To him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood 6and made us a kingdom, priests to his God and Father, to him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen. 7Behold, he is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see him, even those who pierced him, and all tribes of the earth will wail on account of him. Even so. Amen. 8"I am the Alpha and the Omega," says the Lord God, "who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty" (Revelation 1:4-8). ​ John pronounces blessing on the seven churches from Him who is and who was and who is to come, the only One outside of time and existing in the past, present and future (v. 4). He writes of Jesus as the Alpha and Omega, the Greek beginning and ending letters of the alphabet (v. 8). Christ was there in the beginning of creation, and "without him nothing was made that has been made" (John 1:1-3). He is the Bridegroom and the culmination of God's plans for mankind. He then calls Jesus by three names, the Faithful Witness, the One who always tells the truth about this world and where it is going. Secondly, He is called the Firstborn of the Dead, perhaps because He is the first of all human beings to conquer death, being fully God and fully man at the same time. Perhaps He is also called the firstborn because the firstborn of the clan of Abraham carried his blessing down through each generation (Genesis 12:2-3). Jesus is the firstborn head of the church and we Gentiles are adopted and grafted into the branches of the Tree of Faith. Jesus has inherited everything from the Father and freely shares His inheritance with His church. Thirdly, Christ is also called The Ruler of Kings (v. 5). Every knee of presidents and kings will bow before Him and all will be subject to Christ. ​ Verse 6 calls us a kingdom of priests to our God and Father. What is a priest and what comes to mind when the Lord speaks of such things about His people? ​ All earth's inhabitants will see Christ coming with the clouds (v. 7), which could be a reference to the visible Shekinah presence of God that came upon Solomon's temple when it was dedicated (1 Kings 8:10-11), a cloud that withdrew from the temple of God in Jerusalem after their gross sin and idolatry (Ezekiel 10:18). When the Israelites came out of Egypt and wandered for forty years in the wilderness, God led them by a pillar of cloud by day, and a pillar of fire at night. Similarly, Jesus coming with the clouds could be referencing believers with the Lord in heaven mentioned as the "great cloud of witnesses" (Hebrews 12:1). This great cloud of believers is those who have died and are with the Lord and will come with Jesus when He comes: "For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, we also believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in Him" (1 Thessalonians 4:14). It could also be both that is happening, the Shekinah glory cloud on the returning Messiah and those coming in the clouds with Him. There will be those on earth who will see this glorious sight in the midst of the darkness of that Day and will begin to mourn their rebellion and search for a cave to hide from His wrath (Revelation 6:16). Also, the people of Israel, they who pierced Him will see a vision of Him over Jerusalem: "And I will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and pleas for mercy, so that, when they look on me, on him whom they have pierced, they shall mourn for him, as one mourns for an only child, and weep bitterly over him, as one weeps over a firstborn" (Zechariah 12:10). ​ In the Spirit on the Lord's Day ​ 9I, John, your brother and partner in the tribulation and the kingdom and the patient endurance that are in Jesus, was on the island called Patmos on account of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus. 10I was in the Spirit on the Lord's day, and I heard behind me a loud voice like a trumpet 11saying, "Write what you see in a book and send it to the seven churches, to Ephesus and to Smyrna and to Pergamum and to Thyatira and to Sardis and to Philadelphia and to Laodicea" (Revelation 1:9-11). ​ John here tells us that he himself had undergone the distress and tribulation of that day under the Roman emperor Domitian's persecution of believers (v. 9). Many people today think of tribulation as being a time of wrath in the end-times, but the Greek word, thlipsis, translated tribulation (KJV) or distress (NIV), means a heavy downward pressure, a word signifying affliction, trouble, and distress and a time of great difficulty for believers. Tradition tells us that John was boiled in oil, and when he didn't die from it, the Romans banished him to the island of Patmos. John was reminding them that he also was called to live out his life in patient endurance in suffering persecution. ​ What does John mean when he says he was in the Spirit on the Lord's day? ​ By the Lord's day, John was probably meaning the first day of the week (Acts 20:7, 1 Corinthians 16:2), the day of Jesus' resurrection and the meeting and memorial day to the early believers of Christ's victory over death. We cannot know for sure if the apostle John was still in his physical body on earth when he saw the vision of things in the heavenly realm, or if his spirit left his body for a time. We know that Paul the apostle had a similar experience when he stated he was caught up to a heavenly place: ​ 2I know a man in Christ who fourteen years ago was caught up to the third heaven—whether in the body or out of the body I do not know, God knows. 3And I know that this man was caught up into paradise—whether in the body or out of the body I do not know, God knows— 4and he heard things that cannot be told, which man may not utter (2 Corinthians 12:2-4). ​ The evangelist, Philip, after he shared Christ with an Ethiopian eunuch was lifted up bodily and transported to Azotus, where he carried on his mission of preaching (Acts 8:39-40). Elijah was also lifted up bodily with his servants searching the nation for him (2 Kings 2:16). ​ Whatever his experience was, John heard a loud voice like a trumpet (v. 10). This takes the Israelites back to the trumpet sound when God came down on Mount Sinai. The Israelites could not bear God's voice speaking to them and asked Moses to speak to God for them (Exodus 20:18-19). When John heard the trumpet sound he turned and saw the Lord Jesus standing in the middle of seven lampstands in all His glory: ​ The Vision of the Son of Man ​ 12Then I turned to see the voice that was speaking to me, and on turning I saw seven golden lampstands, 13and in the midst of the lampstands one like a son of man, clothed with a long robe and with a golden sash around his chest. 14The hairs of his head were white, like white wool, like snow. His eyes were like a flame of fire, 15his feet were like burnished bronze, refined in a furnace, and his voice was like the roar of many waters. 16In his right hand he held seven stars, from his mouth came a sharp two-edged sword, and his face was like the sun shining in full strength. 17When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead. But he laid his right hand on me, saying, "Fear not, I am the first and the last, 18and the living one. I died, and behold I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of Death and Hades. 19Write therefore the things that you have seen, those that are and those that are to take place after this. 20As for the mystery of the seven stars that you saw in my right hand, and the seven golden lampstands, the seven stars are the angels of the seven churches, and the seven lampstands are the seven churches (Revelation 1:12-20). ​ What stands out to you about this appearance of Jesus and what was John's physical reaction to the Lord Jesus in the heavenly realm? When Jesus walked the earth in the veil of flesh, he seemed like an ordinary man, and so He was. He had to become fully human, in order to take the place of humanity and pay the price of death for all men, but now John was seeing the Lord as He really is today, the glorious King of Heaven and Earth. Verse thirteen describes Jesus as wearing the long robe and golden sash that were worn by priests in the Old Testament (Exodus 28:4), for Christ is our high priest representing us before the Father. Verse 14 reminds us of the prophet Daniel's vision of God: "As I looked, thrones were placed, and the Ancient of Days took his seat; his clothing was white as snow, and the hair of his head like pure wool; his throne was fiery flames; its wheels were burning fire" (Daniel 7:9-10). This is the same One whose face believers will one day see (Revelation 22:4). He is also called the first and the last (v. 17), identifying Him with the LORD spoken of in Isaiah 44:6, and 48:12. The wonderful comforting thought is that Jesus has the keys of Death and Hades. In those days to have keys spoke of having great authority and Jesus is the One who can close or open those doors. Nothing can happen to the believer that is unknown and outside the control of the Lord Jesus. He has conquered Death and Hades. What is meant by the symbolism of Christ walking in between the seven candlesticks? ​ What difference does it make that Christ has the keys of Death and Hades, and how did He come to have them? The seven lampstands represent the seven churches to whom John is to write (v. 20). Jesus is seen in the midst of the seven churches. He is the light that emanates from the church if each church is given over to His leadership. There are some churches that are lifeless, and their light has been snuffed out (Revelation 2:5). There is a spiritual war raging against the church, and the enemy wants to seat ungodly men into positions of leadership in the church, just as he did by getting Annas and Caiaphas into the High Priest position over Israel. When ungodly men rule over the church, the light of Jesus from the church becomes darkness. The seven stars the Lord holds in his hands (v. 16) are the angels of the seven churches. In chapter two and three, John is told to write to each of seven angels, but how can one write on a scroll to angels? The word angel is a translation of the Greek word that means messengers. We have two places in the Scriptures, Luke 9:52; Matthew 11:7-10, where human messengers were spoken of using the Greek word angelous, the word usually translated into English as angels. It could be that John is told to write to what we now call pastors, the chief messengers of the churches, the ones who hold the main responsibility for teaching and oversight in the church. The prophet Daniel likens those who lead many to righteousness as the stars (Daniel 12:3). It is this writer's belief that each church is to have a group of elders who have equal leadership responsibility for the body of believers, but there must be one of the elders who "drives the bus," a first among equals. President Ronald Reagan used to have a plaque on his desk that said, The Buck Stops Here. If all the elders try to drive the bus, the end result is chaos. One godly shepherd (pastor) is required to take responsibility for the direction, under the Lord's headship and leadership, for the guidance of the church. "Unless the LORD builds the house, those who build it labor in vain" (Psalm 127:1). May the Lord use each of us studying the Book of Revelation to be built up as a spiritual house of worship and devotion to Him. In closing this study, it would be a good thing to ask God to give you a new awareness of who He is and what He has done for you. Keith Thomas Website: www.groupbiblestudy.com Email: [email protected] Looking for something slightly different?Click here to discover all of the available series that Group Bible Study offers free of charge!

Study - 10

10. The Great Multitude in Heaven Revelation 7:9-17 ​ In our last study, we looked at the sealing of 144,000 Sealed from Israel. This sealing of what we believe to be Jewish Messianic believers takes place after the Sixth Seal Cosmic Disturbances in the heavens. Both Matthew and Mark's Gospels record that, after the signs in the sky, the Lord intervenes and sends forth His angels to gather all true believers referred to as the "elect." In our last study, we saw this in Matthew's Gospel (24:29-31), let's now also look at what Mark records Jesus as saying: ​ 24But in those days, following that distress, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; 25the stars will fall from the sky, and the heavenly bodies will be shaken.' 26At that time people will see the Son of Man coming in clouds with great power and glory. 27And he will send his angels and gather his elect from the four winds, from the ends of the earth to the ends of the heavens (Mark 13:24-27). This gathering (rapture) of God's people, the elect, takes place in the second half of the seven-year period, no man knows the day or time. Following the time of distress (tribulation @ KJV) and persecution, the sun will be darkened, and there will be a shaking of the earth upon its axis, causing the stars to seem to fall to earth (Isaiah 24:18-23). Mark writes that, at that very time, the Son of Man, the Lord Jesus Himself, will come with great power and glory and send forth His angels to snatch up (rapture) all those who have entered into the New Covenant bought by His blood. Let's now look and see if the Book of Revelation confirms this event of the elect being gathered to heaven: ​ A Great Multitude Standing Before the Throne of God ​ 9After this I looked and saw a multitude too large to count, from every nation and tribe and people and tongue, standing before the throne and before the Lamb. They were wearing white robes and holding palm branches in their hands. 10And they cried out in a loud voice: "Salvation to our God, who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!" 11And all the angels stood around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures. And they fell facedown before the throne and worshiped God, 12saying, "Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanks and honor and power and strength be to our God forever and ever! Amen" (Revelation 7:9-12). ​ Why are the great multitude wearing white robes and holding palm branches? Why would John point out those things? ​ In Revelation 9:16, John writes of a number of 200 million, but here in this vision, he sees a great multitude that is too many to count, clothed in white robes. White robes speak of holiness and purity: "But you do have a few people in Sardis who have not soiled their garments, and because they are worthy, they will walk with Me in white" (Revelation 3:4). Standing with white robes before the presence of God speaks of the priesthood of Israel who wore white garments when they ministered before the Lord. [1] On the Day of Atonement, even the High Priest had to take off his very special robes, and after dipping and cleansing himself in the Mikvah, the ritual bath, could only wear a white robe when he drew near to God. This multitude of people before the throne of God wear the white robes of priests because they have been made priests by being redeemed by the blood of the Lamb. "But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God's special possession..." (1 Peter 2:9). The saved and delivered multitude are also seen holding palm branches, symbolic of celebration as on Palm Sunday when those who welcomed the coming King Jesus into Jerusalem laid down palm branches before Him (John 12:13). Leviticus 23:40 gives Israel the command to rejoice at the Feast of Tabernacles and wave palm branches in celebration before the Lord. The scene before us here is one of great rejoicing before God and the issuing of much thankfulness, not only from the multitude but also from all in attendance. ​ As Matthew and Mark both tell us, the Lord's coming and the angels' gathering the saints happens during the time of distress (tribulation) and after the cosmic signs. How do we know this great multitude standing before the throne are those caught up (raptured) by the angels at the coming of Christ? Some say the multitude of believers is those martyred in the Great Tribulation. My response would be that the passage does not say they were martyred believers; instead, the multitude are those raptured and delivered up by the angels from the persecution and tribulation before God's wrath is poured out. God's wrath is about to occur at the opening of the last and final seal of the scroll in the Lamb's hand. The rapture and the wrath of God are a back-to-back event with no time in between. Jesus gave us two examples of what this time will be like in Luke 17:26-30. Let's first look at the instance of Noah. The Example of Noah's Time (Luke 17:26-27) 26Just as it was in the days of Noah, so also will it be in the days of the Son of Man. 27People were eating, drinking, marrying and being given in marriage up to the day Noah entered the ark. Then the flood came and destroyed them all (Luke 17:26-27). Both Noah and Lot were two righteous men (Hebrews 11:7; 2 Peter 2:7) who lived for God when people lived only for themselves. In Noah's day, the corruption and depth of evil on earth was so bad that God had to judge their sin: "The Lord saw how great the wickedness of the human race had become on the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart was only evil all the time" (Genesis 6:5). Those who were shut out of the ark were complacent or in agreement with the evil around them. They thought everything was fine carrying on their lives with no concern for righteousness or eternal things; they were at home in the evil world in which they lived. They ignored Noah's preaching and only cared for the things of this earth (2 Peter 2:5). Jesus said, "People were eating, drinking, marrying, and being given in marriage up to the day Noah entered the ark" (v. 27). The Lord was saying that, before He comes, there will be a time when terrible evil will be manifest, but just as in Noah's day, people will carry on thinking that everything is O.K., i.e., business as usual, unconcerned about the corruption around them. Eating, drinking, and planning their marriages depicts most people living only for the moment, blissfully callous about the evil practices going on in the world and unaware of the impending judgment. When Noah preached that the Lord was going to judge them, the people ignored his proclamation of judgment (2 Peter 2:4-5). It is the same today; most people carry on unconcerned about what God has said. When the Lord ushered His chosen into the ark and shut the door, judgment fell that same day (Genesis 7:11-16). Notice, it says the same day! There will be no second chance once believers are lifted, snatched up, or raptured. The door will be shut (Matthew 25:10; Luke 13:28). The time to make peace with God is now. The Lord gave a second example of what it would be like at the time of His coming: The Example from Lot's Time 28It was the same in the days of Lot. People were eating and drinking, buying and selling, planting and building. 29But the day Lot left Sodom, fire and sulfur rained down from heaven and destroyed them all. 30It will be just like this on the day the Son of Man is revealed (Luke 17:28-30). What is the lesson we should take to our hearts from Jesus' words above? In both examples, the Lord intervened to spare the godly, while on the same day, He began the judgment of the ungodly. In the passage we are studying in Revelation, the Lord has not yet opened the seventh seal bringing God's wrath; the focus is on the events that occur before God's wrath begins. At the sixth seal cosmic disturbances, we read of those people outside of Christ, searching for a place to hide from the presence of the Lord, and crying out, "Fall on us and hide us from the face of him who is seated on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb, 17for the great day of their wrath has come, and who can stand?" (Revelation 6:16-17 ESV). Who can stand? There is only one place where people can stand at such a time, and believers from Israel and all over the world are those caught up to God's throne and standing before God in pure white (Revelation 7:9). Washed and Clean White Robes ​ 13Then one of the elders addressed me: "These in white robes," he asked, "who are they, and where have they come from?" 14"Sir," I answered, "you know." So he replied, "These are the ones who have come out of the great tribulation; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. 15For this reason, they are before the throne of God and serve Him day and night in His temple; and the One seated on the throne will spread His tabernacle over them. 16'Never again will they hunger, and never will they thirst; nor will the sun beat down upon them, nor any scorching heat.' 17For the Lamb in the center of the throne will be their shepherd. 'He will lead them to springs of living water,' and 'God will wipe away every tear from their eyes'" (Revelation 7:13-17). ​ In verses 9-17 above, what words or phrases speak the most to you about God's character and purposes? What phrases would you underline as personally speaking to you? Let us take a few moments to consider those standing before the throne. If there was a pre-tribulation rapture before the Antichrist came on the scene at the start of the seven-year period, why do we not see the pre-tribulation saints welcoming the great multitude? We read of the Lamb, the angels, the elders, and the four living creatures standing around the throne, and God Himself seated on the throne, but no sign of any pre-tribulation believers in the welcome party (Revelation 7:9-14). I believe we don't see any pre-tribulation believers welcoming the great multitude because there is only one rapture, and it takes place at the time we read in this passage, just after the cosmic signs that Jesus spoke about. Instead of the Church thinking we are not going to see any hardship or tribulation, we should prepare our hearts to endure distress and persecution. The Ten Virgins Parable is quite clear in telling us that the five foolish virgins did not get to come in after the door was shut. I don't hear of Jesus whispering to the five foolish virgins to come back later and He will let them in. No, dear friends, the scripture tells us that the door was shut and the pleas of the five foolish to get in to the marriage supper were not granted when they tried to get in later (Matthew 25:10). We see those who have gone through the Great Tribulation (Distress, NIV) getting the opportunity to serve God day and night in His temple, and that God will spread his tent over them (a picture of marriage, Ruth 3:9), and the wiping away of their tears (Revelation 7:13-17). The word "Amen!" was spoken by the angels in verse eleven. Amen is a word that means "let it be" or "so be it." ​ How Were this Great Multitude Gathered to Heaven? ​ Some believe that the great multitude of people is martyred during the Great Tribulation or Distress time, but we should always let the Scripture interpret itself. Both Matthew and Mark's Gospels say explicitly that these are gathered into heaven by the angels in what today we call the rapture (Matthew 24:29-31; Mark 13:24-27). The word rapture is a word we use to describe the true Church, those born again of God, being caught up to heaven. The word rapture itself is not in the Bible. The English word comes from the Latin word rapere, meaning rapid. The Latin infinitive rapere is from the original Greek word harpazō, translated as "caught up" in the New International Version and King James Bible (1 Thessalonians 4:17). The Greek word, harpazō, means: "to strip, spoil, snatch. To seize upon with force or to rob. It is an open act of confiscatory violence...to snatch or tear away, yank away, pluck out of, remove by swiftly and aggressively grasping."[2] The angels will come and catch or snatch us up to heaven. Let's look more closely at this event on God's timetable. ​ First, let's examine together 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18, and we will see what the Apostle Paul has to say about the rapture or being caught up: ​ 13Brothers, we do not want you to be ignorant about those who fall asleep, or to grieve like the rest of men, who have no hope. 14We believe that Jesus died and rose again and so we believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in him. 15According to the Lord's own word, we tell you that we who are still alive, who are left till the coming of the Lord, will certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep. 16For the Lord Himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. 17After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever. 18Therefore encourage each other with these words (1 Thessalonians 4:13-18 emphasis mine). ​ Three times in the passage above, Paul writes about those who have fallen asleep. He's talking about Christians who have died. When a person that knows the Lord dies, his body may be in the grave, but the person, i.e., his or her spirit, goes on to be with the Lord; so, in a sense, he never dies (John 11:11-14). He's referred to as being "asleep." When Christ comes down from heaven, verse 14 tells us that He will bring with Him the spirits of the departed believers that are with Him in heaven. Their resurrection bodies will rise first before those who are alive and remain on earth are caught up also to be with the Lord. The phrase caught up in verse 17 is the Greek word, harpazō, from which we get the word "rapture." ​ Paul the Apostle wrote to the Corinthian church: "in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed" (1 Corinthians 15:52). ​ How Will We Be Changed at the Rapture? As we have said, when Christ returns at the rapture, those who have previously fallen asleep (died in Christ) will come with the Lord and have their bodies come up from the grave and reunited with their spirit in the air. ​ 28"Do not marvel at this; for an hour is coming, in which all who are in the tombs will hear His voice, 29and will come forth; those who did the good deeds to a resurrection of life, those who committed the evil deeds to a resurrection of judgment (John 5:28-29). This event is called the resurrection of the dead or the first resurrection. There are two resurrections. The first will be at the rapture, where the dead in Christ will rise first. Those who are still alive on earth will also go up to meet the Lord in the air with a new body. This body will be a glorious body into which we change "in the twinkling of an eye" (1 Corinthians 15:42); how blessed will be those who experience this rapture or resurrection! 4I saw thrones on which were seated those who had been given authority to judge. And I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded because of their testimony about Jesus and because of the word of God. They had not worshiped the beast or its image and had not received its mark on their foreheads or their hands. They came to life and reigned with Christ a thousand years. 5(The rest of the dead did not come to life until the thousand years were ended.) This is the first resurrection (Revelation 20:4-5). The second resurrection is one of judgment for those who reject God's offer of a free pardon through the substitutionary death of Christ in their place, and will occur after the thousand-year millennial reign of Christ at the Great White Throne judgment (Revelation 20:7-12). Daniel the prophet also writes about the dead being raised: 1"At that time Michael, the great prince who protects your people, will arise. There will be a time of distress such as has not happened from the beginning of nations until then. But at that time your people—everyone whose name is found written in the book—will be delivered. 2Multitudes who sleep in the dust of the earth will awake: some to everlasting life, others to shame and everlasting contempt. 3Those who are wise will shine like the brightness of the heavens, and those who lead many to righteousness, like the stars for ever and ever. 4But you, Daniel, roll up and seal the words of the scroll until the time of the end. Many will go here and there to increase knowledge" (Daniel 12:1-4). At the first resurrection or rapture, the saints are clothed with a resurrection body similar to Christ's resurrection body. There will be some continuity in that we will be recognizable, but we are talking about an imperishable body, i.e., a body raised with the glory of God shining from us. Paul writes that we will not all go through the experience of death, but we will be changed: 49And just as we have borne the likeness of the earthly man, so shall we bear the likeness of the man from heaven. 50I declare to you, brothers, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. 51Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed— 52in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. 53For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality (1 Corinthians 15:49-53). Which sentences stand out to you from this passage? What do you think it means to have an immortal body? (1 Corinthians 15:42). That which is on the inside, your godly character, will someday be revealed. It won't be the same as our old nature; Paul says that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God (v. 50). It will no longer be perishable but imperishable (v. 53). We won't all sleep, i.e. not all Christians will be separated from their bodies. Some are transformed instantly without going through the death process. When Christ comes, in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, or the time it takes to bat your eyes, we will be changed from having a perishable body to being clothed with an imperishable body (vv. 51-52). Paul speaks of this transformation in his letter to the church at Philippi: 20But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, 21who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body (Philippians 3:20-21 Emphasis mine). This Greek word translated to our English word transform (v. 21) is the word Metaschēmatizō. It is a construction of two Greek words. Meta means a change of place or condition, and schēma implies shape or outward form. i.e., to transform, change the outer form or appearance of something, refashion, reshape. [3] An imperishable body means that we won't age or get sick. Our new bodies will be glorious all of the time. You will always have youthful strength and be radiantly beautiful with God's glory radiating from you. Just as Jesus walked through walls into the upper room when the door was locked for fear of the Jews (John 20:19), we will also pass through walls and travel instantaneously, not bound by the physical realm. Paul wrote that our new body would be like Christ's glorious body (Philippians 3:21). This radiance that accompanies us will be both authoritative and beautiful. Jesus said that "the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their father" (Matthew 13:43. Emphasis mine). Those who belong to Christ will command respect born of wisdom from above. There will be kindness and joy that will be ours. It will also be a powerful body (1 Corinthians 15:43). I don't think this speaks only of strength, although that will be part of it. There will be power and authority, for we will be like Him when we see Him as He is. Our bodies will be raised, and we will see His face and be transformed into His image. Oh, what a day that will be! Prayer: Father, thank You for Your wonderful grace and mercy in sending Your Son, the Lord Jesus, to pay the penalty for our sin and for buying us out of Satan's clutches. We long for the day when we will stand before You as a great multitude from every nation and tribe and people and tongue. Hallelujah! Come quickly, Lord Jesus! Keith Thomas Email: Website: www.groupbiblestudy.com All scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version, Copyright Ó 1973, 1978, 1984 by Biblica, Inc.Ô Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. [1] [2] Key Word Study Bible. AMG Publishers. 773 Harpazō. [3] Key Word Study Bible. AMG Publishers, Page 1651

Study - 11

11. The Seventh Seal Trumpets Revelation 8 & 9 On March 27, 1980, a series of small earthquakes brought a dormant volcano to life called Mount St. Helens in Skamania County, Washington State, in the Northwest of the USA. The mountain had been dormant since its last period of activity in the 1840s and 1850s. Geologists studying the rumbling and earthquakes warned the residents that magma might be moving below the volcano. For nearly two months, all in the area were informed that Mount St. Helens could blow. A man by the name of Harry R. Truman refused to hear the warnings of impending destruction. He had built up a million-dollar business by renting out 100 boats he had on fifty-four acres of land beside Spirit Lake at the foot of the volcano. He didn't believe the area could be destroyed, so he stayed and ignored the warnings, thus becoming the focus of national media because of his stubbornness. Perhaps, he thought that he would see rivers of lava come down. However, it was not to be. The searing blast came at 8:32 a.m. on May 18, 1980, traveling at around 300 mph. People estimate that Harry Truman perhaps had time to turn his head before being buried under 150 feet of landslide and mudflows. His life ended because of his stubbornness in refusing to listen to the warnings of impending destruction. We are continuing to study the breaking of seven seals on a scroll in the hands of the Lord Jesus. In Chapters 8 & 9 we will witness the wrath of God as the final seal is opened and the seven trumpets, and the seven bowls of wrath are poured out upon the earth. In His mercy, God gives us a solemn warning and reveals what will happen at this time. This is a strong admonition for those who have hardened their hearts to turn to the Lord before this "great and terrible day of the Lord" (Joel 2:31). What are the reasons people ignore warnings such as Harry R. Truman did about the eruption of Mt. St. Helens? What warning signs do you see in the earth today? This writer believes that the events taking place during the opening of the first six seals of the Book of Revelation are not the wrath of God but consequences on earth due to the departure by many of earth's inhabitants from all moral standards. When the Lord broke the sixth seal of the scroll, we saw cosmic signs in the sky and the worldwide movement of the earth's crust: "every mountain and island was removed from its place" (Revelation 6:12-14), and those who have hardened their hearts to the Lord begin to seek a place to hide from the wrath of the Lamb that is now about to be poured out upon them (Revelation 6:15-17). There is no Scriptural evidence of God's wrath poured out before the cosmic signs in the sky. In fact, the Antichrist sits in the temple of God proclaiming himself as a god (2 Thessalonians 2:4), and makes war against the saints, the elect of God, those who refuse to take his mark and worship him: "It was given power to wage war against God's holy people and to conquer them. And it was given authority over every tribe, people, language and nation" (Revelation 13:7). If he is making war on the saints, then the people of God are still present on the earth up to this point. It is my opinion that the cosmic signs herald the wrath of God. Both Matthew (24:29-31) and Mark (13:24-27) record Jesus telling us that, after the cosmic signs, i.e., the sun darkened, the moon not giving its light, the movement of the stars, the world would see Him coming in great glory in the sky, and at that time, He would send forth His angels to gather His elect (those who belong to Christ). In chapter seven of the Book of Revelation, we read about the sealing of 144,000, specifically from the nation of Israel. This writer believes these individuals are Jewish Messianic believers from the land of Israel; God shows His people that He has not forgotten the promises He gave Israel that He will bring forth a remnant from the tribes of Israel (Isaiah 10:20; Romans 11:5). The seal speaks of ownership, deliverance, and salvation (Ezekiel 9:4-6; Ephesians 1:13). Along with them are also seen a great multitude of Gentiles (non-Jews) who have responded to the Gospel from every nation, tribe, people, and tongue. These individuals seen in heaven are robed in white, symbolizing purity and righteousness, not as a result of their own works, but as a result of the Lamb's (Jesus) blood shed for them (Revelation 7:14). Those before the throne of God are those caught up (raptured) by the angels to heaven. The Apostle John writes of a silence in heaven that takes place after the gathering of the elect of God and the breaking of the seventh seal of the scroll. ​ The Seventh Seal and the Golden Censer ​ 1When he opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven for about half an hour. ​ If you belong to Christ, this is a scene you will see someday. How do you interpret the silence as Jesus opens the seventh and last seal on the scroll in His hands? Why was the silence so long? ​ After the scene of loud worship and praise in Revelation chapter seven, there is now a solemn silence as all eyes focus on Jesus as He breaks the last seal and opens the scroll. The multitude of people standing before the throne are all aware that everything is about to change because the Lord Jesus is going to bring justice to the earth. This thirty minutes of silence is a solemn moment in time and will seem like an eternity. ​ 2And I saw the seven angels who stand before God, and seven trumpets were given to them. 3Another angel, who had a golden censer, came and stood at the altar. He was given much incense to offer, with the prayers of all God's people, on the golden altar in front of the throne. 4The smoke of the incense, together with the prayers of God's people, went up before God from the angel's hand. 5Then the angel took the censer, filled it with fire from the altar, and hurled it on the earth; and there came peals of thunder, rumblings, flashes of lightning and an earthquake (Revelation 8:2-5). ​ As everyone watches, seven mighty angels step forward. In the original Greek text, the definite article tells us that these angels are not the kind of angels we usually read about; these are the seven angels that stand before God. Luke's Gospel tells of one of the Presence Angels, Gabriel, who appeared to Zechariah the priest, father of John the Baptist: "The angel answered, 'I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God, and I have been sent to speak to you and to tell you this good news'" (Luke 1:19). To stand in God's presence is a position of high honor, and here we read of seven archangels who come close to the throne and are given seven trumpets. Another angel comes before the golden altar of incense before God with a golden censer, a covered incense burner hanging on golden chains.[1] He was given much incense to offer to symbolize prayer and supplication to God for justice. These prayers are likely similar to the prayers we read about at the opening of the fifth seal: "How long, Sovereign Lord, holy and true, until you judge the inhabitants of the earth and avenge our blood?" (Revelation 6:10). The prayers of God's people for justice are now acted upon by God. The judgment of God is only now taking place at the opening of the seventh seal. The solemn silence is finished as the hot coals from the censer are thrown to the earth, bringing "peals of thunder, rumblings, flashes of lightning and an earthquake" (v. 5). ​ The Trumpets ​ 6Then the seven angels who had the seven trumpets prepared to sound them. 7The first angel sounded his trumpet, and there came hail and fire mixed with blood, and it was hurled down on the earth. A third of the earth was burned up, a third of the trees were burned up, and all the green grass was burned up. 8The second angel sounded his trumpet, and something like a huge mountain, all ablaze, was thrown into the sea. A third of the sea turned into blood, 9a third of the living creatures in the sea died, and a third of the ships were destroyed. 10The third angel sounded his trumpet, and a great star, blazing like a torch, fell from the sky on a third of the rivers and on the springs of water— 11the name of the star is Wormwood. A third of the waters turned bitter, and many people died from the waters that had become bitter (Revelation 8:6-11). ​ Trumpets were sounded in Israel as a call to battle, as in Gideon's war with the Amalekites (Judges 7:16). Trumpets were also used when Joshua blew trumpets, and Jericho's walls fell )Joshua 6:20). A trumpet was also sounded when kings came on the scene, and at the sound of the seven loud trumpet blasts, the King of Kings is about to make war on those who hate Him. Paul, the Apostle, wrote: 7"This will happen when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven in blazing fire with his powerful angels. 8He will punish those who do not know God and do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. 9They will be punished with everlasting destruction and shut out from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might" (2 Thessalonians 1:7-9). The blazing fire (v. 7) about which Paul spoke is now taking place at the opening of the seventh seal. A third of the earth, a third of the trees, and all the green grass are burned. When the second trumpet sounds, something that looks like a huge mountain, perhaps an asteroid, hits the sea with coastal cities bearing the brunt of the tsunami it creates. At the sounding of the third trumpet, a third of all freshwater is poisoned, i.e. the rivers, lakes, and springs. Could this be nuclear fallout on a third of the earth? We don't know what continents or nations are included in this judgment, but this is only the prelude; it is hard to imagine things getting much worse, but they do. ​ 12The fourth angel sounded his trumpet, and a third of the sun was struck, a third of the moon, and a third of the stars, so that a third of them turned dark. A third of the day was without light, and also a third of the night. 13As I watched, I heard an eagle that was flying in midair call out in a loud voice: "Woe! Woe! Woe to the inhabitants of the earth, because of the trumpet blasts about to be sounded by the other three angels!" (Revelation 8:12-13). ​ When the fourth angel sounds his trumpet, the light of the sun, moon, and stars is diminished by thirty-three percent, likely causing havoc on all food production. John hears an eagle proclaim woe to the inhabitants of earth for that which is yet to come. In the Hebrew language, when one desires to emphasize something they say it twice, which is why you will often read Jesus saying, "truly, truly, I say to you..." (John 5:24), but here we have great emphasis by three woes pronounced together. Things are going to get worse. ​ The Fifth Trumpet ​ 1Then the fifth angel sounded his trumpet, and I saw a star that had fallen from heaven to earth, and it was given the key to the pit of the Abyss. 2The star opened the pit of the Abyss, and smoke rose out of it like the smoke of a great furnace, and the sun and the air were darkened by the smoke from the pit. 3And out of the smoke, locusts descended on the earth, and they were given power like that of the scorpions of the earth. 4They were told not to harm the grass of the earth or any plant or tree, but only those who did not have the seal of God on their foreheads. 5The locusts were not given power to kill them, but only to torment them for five months, and their torment was like the stinging of a scorpion. 6In those days men will seek death and will not find it; they will long to die, but death will escape them (Revelation 9:1-6). ​ At the sound of the fifth trumpet, a star falls from heaven. Angels are often symbolized as stars (Revelation 1:20), so this is likely an angel opening the Abyss' pit. The result of the Abyss being opened brings great darkness to the earth's atmosphere (v. 2). To the Apostle John looking at the creatures that come forth, he describes them as locusts with the sting of scorpions that brings pain to all who have taken sides with the Antichrist and rejected the Gospel. John writes that people will seek death, but death will escape them. How can a man seek to die but be unable? ​ This inability to die could be the possible result of those who upload their conscious self into a computer, popularized by the movie Transcendence with actor Johnny Depp. This plan by elites is also known as Transhumanism[2] or Human 2.0[3], i.e. a plan by elites to overcome death by becoming part of the growing number who want to overcome the weakness of humanity with the aid of technology. This is not fiction, but a very real idea which has funded research behind it. I encourage you to read the links provided below.[4] This could be one explanation for why some could not die. It may be that they have tampered with their humanity. ​ 7And the locusts looked like horses prepared for battle, with something like crowns of gold on their heads, and faces like the faces of men. 8They had hair like that of women, and teeth like those of lions. 9They also had thoraxes like breastplates of iron, and the sound of their wings was like the roar of many horses and chariots rushing into battle. 10They had tails with stingers like scorpions, which had the power to injure people for five months. 11They were ruled by a king, the angel of the Abyss. His name in Hebrew is Abaddon, and in Greek it is Apollyon. 12The first woe has passed. Behold, two woes are still to follow (Revelation 9:7-12). ​ Apollyon or Abaddon is likely a ruling evil angel controlling demons from a place under the earth in Hades. He is released to cause chaos and disorder to all the earth. ​ The Sixth Trumpet ​ 13Then the sixth angel sounded his trumpet, and I heard a voice from the four horns of the golden altar before God 14saying to the sixth angel with the trumpet, "Release the four angels who are bound at the great river the Euphrates." 15So the four angels who had been prepared for this hour and day and month and year were released to kill a third of mankind. 16And the number of mounted troops was two hundred million; I heard their number.17Now the horses and riders in my vision looked like this: The riders had breastplates the colors of fire, sapphire, and sulfur. The heads of the horses were like the heads of lions, and out of their mouths proceeded fire, smoke, and sulfur. 18A third of mankind was killed by the three plagues of fire, smoke, and sulfur that proceeded from their mouths. 19For the power of the horses was in their mouths and in their tails; indeed, their tails were like snakes, having heads with which to inflict harm (Revelation 9:13-19). With the sounding of the sixth trumpet, four angels bound at the River Euphrates are released to kill a third of the remaining people who survived the first five trumpet judgments. Some believe that the two hundred million mounted troops are humans, but it seems to this writer that from their description, these creatures may be created by fusing the DNA of animals with humans,[5] either that or demonic hordes. The angels who release the riders and horses have been bound up till now. We do not know if they are good or evil angels, we are only told that they are released to act at the command of God. They have been bound up until this point, restrained at the river Euphrates, having been prepared to act at this precise time. 20Now the rest of mankind who were not killed by these plagues still did not repent of the works of their hands. They did not stop worshiping demons and idols of gold, silver, bronze, stone, and wood, which cannot see or hear or walk. 21Furthermore, they did not repent of their murder, sorcery, sexual immorality, and theft (Revelation 9:20-21). After these terrible tragedies and death all over the earth, why do we twice read that they would not repent? Why do some people set their will against God and harden their hearts the way that Pharaoh did during the ten plagues that God brought upon Egypt in Moses' time? The fact we are told they "still would not repent" (Rev. 9:20-21) seems to indicate that the people left on earth could still repent if they chose to. But we are not told of anyone repenting. There may be people on earth at this time who are not believers, but did not take the mark of the Beast. Even today, there are those who see the signs of the times and have withdrawn from society. Some perhaps took extreme measures to live "off the grid" but have still not surrendered to the Lordship of Christ. We are looking at a time when some will not repent because of the way they have chosen to live up until this time and have damaged their conscience to the point that they no longer have sensitivity to good and evil. Jack Weltman writes this about a seared conscience: ​ "If we suppress the conviction of the Spirit of God and resist Him and keep on sinning, after a time, the conscience is so seared or burnt that we cannot hear the Spirit speak to our conscience anymore. That's because God has given every one of us His light, so even with "their conscience bearing witness and their thoughts alternately accusing or defending them (Rom 2;15), they simply suppress this knowledge (Rom 1:18) and eventually, the conscience cannot hear what the Spirit of God is telling them. The more a person suppresses (ignores) the voice of the Spirit, the harder it is for the Spirit of God to speak to them about their sin. If this continues, the conscience will become like a callous on a hand... it will not feel anything anymore. Paul wrote to Timothy that "the Spirit explicitly says that in later times some will fall away from the faith, paying attention to deceitful spirits and doctrines of demons, by means of the hypocrisy of liars seared in their own conscience as with a branding iron" (1 Tim. 4: 1-2). With such terror taking place on the earth, John is astounded to tell us twice that there is no repentance among the earth's inhabitants. He writes first about the rest of humanity's unrepentant state; that they held on to the works of their hands, their labor, and that they refused to stop their worship of demons and false idols. John then writes that they would not repent of the murder of believers during the persecution that takes place in the second half of the seven years. They wouldn't change their minds or habits of sorcery and drugs, for the Greek word, pharmakeía, translated as sorcery in verse 21 (from pharmakeuō, "administer drugs"), means drug-related sorcery.[6] The Lord also brings up the abomination of sexual sins and theft. Sexual immorality refers to sexual acts outside of the confines of marriage. In our beginning illustration, we saw that Harry Truman resisted the many warnings of danger from the rumblings under Mount St. Helens. Why did Mr. Harry R. Truman refuse to take action and leave the vicinity when the warning came? Perhaps he thought he would have time and that the lava would flow slowly enough, or that the warnings of impending doom for those who stayed in the area were lies, or at best an exaggeration of what could potentially happen if the volcano erupted. This man obviously thought he was in control. Whatever it was that kept him from taking action; greed, pride, ignorance or stubbornness, it cost him his life. The loss of his life was needless, as he had been warned, but refused the truth that could have saved him. At the trumpet judgments, many will refuse to listen to reason and will not change their minds or the direction of their lives. Their destruction will be complete, and God is vindicated in their judgment. Have you wondered about the evil in this world today and how it seems that so many innocent people suffer while people who do evil in this world continue to thrive? Does it make you angry that people in this world suffer needlessly and starve while the majority of the wealth is held by a small margin of the earth's inhabitants? If it makes you angry to see the suffering and injustice in our world and the destruction of God's creation, how much more do you think the Lord of Hosts is angered by these things? He sees all things. We cannot comprehend the amount of sorrow He has witnessed. If we could comprehend this, we would be awestruck at His mercy. When He comes again, He will come in His majesty and power to make all things new. Maybe you have somehow come across this message on the Internet. Do not think it a coincidence. There are no coincidences with God. The Lord has led you to consider the direction of your life at this moment in time. I implore you through the written word. Do not wait another minute. Get your life right with God now. God is not willing that any should perish but that all would come to repentance (2 Peter 3:9). Here is a typical prayer you could pray: Prayer: Father, I now come to You, believing that You have a plan for my life. Thank You for loving me and sending your Son into the world to pay the penalty for my sin, which has kept me so long from enjoying Your presence. I repent and turn away from sin and ask Christ to come and live in me as I give Him control of my life. Thank You, Father, for the gift of eternal life. Amen! Keith Thomas Website: www.groupbiblestudy.com Email: [1] [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transhumanism [3] https://www.forbes.com/sites/cognitiveworld/2018/10/01/human-2-0-is-coming-faster-than-you-think-will-you-evolve-with-the-times/#245ff1cd4284 [4] https://endtimeheadlines.org/2020/06/the-push-for-transhumanism-to-overcome-sickness-aging-and-death/ [5] [6] https://www.gotquestions.org/Bible-sorcery.html Looking for something slightly different?Click here to discover all of the available series that group Bible Study offers free of charge!

Study - 12

12. The Two Witnesses Revelation 10-11 As we come to the tenth chapter of the Book of Revelation, there is a second interlude. The first interlude came at the end of the events of the sixth seal in the sixth chapter. Chapter seven took our eyes off the devastation on earth and focused our attention on the 144,000 Messianic believers saved and sealed from Israel and a great multitude of Gentiles (non-Jews) standing clothed in white before the throne of God. The second interlude happens at the end of the blowing of the sixth trumpet. In chapter ten, John's vision focuses our attention on a mighty angel (vv. 1-7) and a little scroll that the Apostle must eat and allow the Words of God to be internalized and spoken under the anointing of the Spirit. In chapter eleven, John then writes of his vision of two witnesses' ministry before the blowing of the seventh trumpet (11:1-19). We begin our study with John seeing an awesome sight - that of a mighty angel descending to earth: ​ 1Then I saw another mighty angel coming down from heaven. He was robed in a cloud, with a rainbow above his head; his face was like the sun, and his legs were like fiery pillars. 2He was holding a little scroll, which lay open in his hand. He planted his right foot on the sea and his left foot on the land, 3and he gave a loud shout like the roar of a lion. When he shouted, the voices of the seven thunders spoke. 4And when the seven thunders spoke, I was about to write; but I heard a voice from heaven say, "Seal up what the seven thunders have said and do not write it down." 5Then the angel I had seen standing on the sea and on the land raised his right hand to heaven. 6And he swore by him who lives for ever and ever, who created the heavens and all that is in them, the earth and all that is in it, and the sea and all that is in it, and said, "There will be no more delay! 7But in the days when the seventh angel is about to sound his trumpet, the mystery of God will be accomplished, just as he announced to his servants the prophets" (Revelation 10:1-7). ​ Why do you think the angel is shown as having one foot on the earth and one foot on the sea? The description of the angel robed in a cloud reminds us of Daniel's vision of the Messiah coming on the clouds of heaven (Daniel 7:13). His face is like the sun (v. 1), he has a rainbow above his head, and he speaks with a loud shout like the roar of a lion. The roar is not like that of a lion, but the emphasis is on the mighty shout, signifying that it can be heard from a long distance. It is a sound that sends shivers down the spine of all who listen to the voice. Due to these observations, some people have suggested that this mighty angel coming down from heaven could be the Lord Jesus. This writer disagrees with that interpretation for the following reasons: In the first verse, John describes him as another mighty angel. The Greek text brings out that the word another means another of the same kind. There is none like the Lord Jesus, and so if this person were the Lord Jesus, John would not have compared him to the other angels of the same kind. Secondly, this angel swears by someone greater, viz. the Creator of the heavens (v. 6), whereby Jesus, being God, cannot swear by anyone higher (Hebrews 6:13). He is the great I AM—the One by which all things were created. Paul the Apostle wrote the following about the Lord Jesus: For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him (Colossians 1:16). The angel's stance is significant. We see that he has one foot planted on the earth, one foot on the sea, and his right hand raised to heaven. This may symbolize the three spheres of the created order (Gen. 6:1-10). Whatever is about to happen will affect ALL of creation. We are not told who this mighty angel is, but he speaks with the authority that there will be no more delay (v. 6). The Apostle John heard the seven thunders' voice, but when he went to write down what they said, he is prevented from doing so (v. 4). John is told that only when the seventh angel is about to blow his trumpet, the mystery of God will be accomplished (v. 7). When the mystery of God is finally revealed, it will unite all things under the headship of Christ. We are left to wonder what the mystery is that will be clear to all at the end time. ​ Certain things were not for us to understand when John wrote the Book of Revelation in A.D. 95. As we get closer to the end of the age, it is possible that humanity will realize that the earth has been under a spiritual conflict for man's mind and will. Jesus' Parable of the Wheat and the Weeds taught us that, as the wheat (believers in Christ) and the weeds (the ungodly) grew together, the cloak of deception covered the identity of the weeds until just before the harvest (Matthew 13:24-30 and Matthew 13:36-43). Before the coming of the Lord, the enemy will no longer be hidden but made manifest. Yes, there is coming a time when all things will be revealed! That which has been going on in the spiritual realm, i.e., the war between God and Satan, will be visible. ​ Why has God delayed intervention for approximately two thousand years? Was it only for a greater harvest, or was there more going on than a larger number of people? ​ So, why has God not intervened before this point? The answer is that God has been calling and preparing a body of people, the Bride of Christ, to rule and reign with Christ on earth. Their training in overcoming evil and preparation for ruling and reigning with Christ will be complete when God's people, the elect, are caught up to heaven as in what we read in chapter seven. The Father alone knows the timing of this event (Matthew 24:36). The Body of Christ, the Bride, has been in training over the last 2,000 years to overcome the darkness through prayer and spiritual warfare, living not for themselves but for their King. Soon will come the time of receiving the rewards they have earned, i.e., when every enemy is put down (1 Corinthians 15:24-26). John then receives further instruction from heaven. ​ 8Then the voice that I had heard from heaven spoke to me once more: "Go, take the scroll that lies open in the hand of the angel who is standing on the sea and the land." 9So I went to the angel and asked him to give me the little scroll. He said to me, "Take it and eat it. It will turn your stomach sour, but 'in your mouth it will be as sweet as honey.'" 10I took the little scroll from the angel's hand and ate it. It tasted as sweet as honey in my mouth, but when I had eaten it, my stomach turned sour. 11Then I was told, "You must prophesy again about many peoples, nations, languages and kings" (Revelation 10:8-11). ​ What do you think is the significance of the scroll being both sweet to the taste and bitter to the stomach after eating? ​ John hears the voice from heaven, telling him to take a little scroll that lies open in the angel's hand. When he draws near the angel's intimidating presence, he asks the angel to give him the scroll, but the scroll is not given; it must be taken from the hand of the angel (v. 9). God puts some ministries before men that can be compared to a sweet taste of honey in service to God; however, with the sweetness also comes pain and hardship to those that take up such a service. God never forces anyone to take up the cross; it must be a willing service from His people. Our hearts must be willing to take up the task, though it is at the same time sweet and bitter. Paul the Apostle, for instance, writes about the ministry he was given in this way: ​ 10We are fools for Christ, but you are wise in Christ. We are weak, but you are strong. You are honored, but we are dishonored. 11To this very hour we are hungry and thirsty, we are poorly clothed, we are brutally treated, we are homeless. 12We work hard with our own hands. When we are vilified, we bless; when we are persecuted, we endure it; 13when we are slandered, we answer gently. Up to this moment we have become the scum of the earth, the refuse of the world (1 Corinthians 4:10-13). The preacher must internalize the message of God. Some minister God's word today whose hearts are not touched by the message the Lord gives them. God's message must burn in the preacher's heart before we can expect God's message to touch people's hearts. Jeremiah the prophet said, "When your words came, I ate them; they were my joy and my heart's delight, for I bear your name, LORD God Almighty" (Jeremiah 15:16). The worst parts of John's writing and prophesying are still ahead for him, i.e., the spiritual war written about in chapter 12 and the writing down of the Antichrist's war against the saints in chapter 13 (specifically in verse 7). The writing also of the seven bowl judgments in Revelation 16 is still ahead for him as well. Such a message will weigh heavily on John's heart as he continues to write down the prophecy. ​ The Two Witnesses (Chapter Eleven) ​ At the beginning of chapter eleven, John's view of chronological time is paused until the seven bowls of wrath are begun to be poured out in chapter 16. Chapters eleven through fifteen focus our attention to explain events on earth that precede the Day of the Lord, i.e., the coming of Christ for His people and the Judgment of God poured out. This explaining of specific events is similar to what Jesus taught the disciples on the Mount of Olives when they asked Him what would be the sign of His coming and the end of the age (Matthew 24:3). From verses 3-31, the Lord talked chronologically of the significant events until His coming for His elect. He then focused His teaching on making themselves ready for His coming, e.g., the Lesson of the Fig Tree (vv. 32-35), the Day and Time Unknown (vv. 36-51), the Parable of the Ten Virgins (25:1-13), the Parable of the Talents (25:14-30), and the Separation of the Sheep and Goats (25:31-46). This writer's view is that Revelation chapters 11 through 14 focus similarly on specific incidents in the second half of the seven-year period, commonly known as Daniel's Seventieth Week. The link to the below chart might help some people as we focus specifically on some of the events of the second half of the seven-year period. ​ Chart of events that take place before Christ sets up His Kingdom (See https://prewrathresources.wordpress.com/free-pre-wrath-charts/#jp-carousel-430.) ​ Now that we have an idea of John's focus, let's view these events up close as he describes them: ​ 1I was given a reed like a measuring rod and was told, "Go and measure the temple of God and the altar, with its worshipers. 2But exclude the outer court; do not measure it, because it has been given to the Gentiles. They will trample on the holy city for 42 months (Revelation 11:1-2). John is given a measuring reed and told to measure the temple and the altar and its worshipers. Scholars have difficulty with this chapter, and especially as to the measuring of the temple. Suffice it to say that a new temple will be built in Israel, a temple that will be desecrated according to Paul the Apostle (2 Thessalonians 2:4) at the mid-point of the seventieth week of Daniel (Daniel 9:27), i.e., the last seven years before the end of the age. ​ John writes that, for forty-two months, three and a half years, the second half of the seven-year period, the Gentile armies (likely to be the Antichrist's armies) will take control of the temple mount at the mid-point and control the city of Jerusalem for forty-two months (v. 2). Jesus warned His disciples to get out of Jerusalem when they saw the Antichrist's desecration, i.e., the event called the Abomination of Desolation: 15So when you see standing in the holy place 'the abomination of desolation,' described by the prophet Daniel (let the reader understand), 16then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains. 17Let no one on the housetop come down to retrieve anything from his house. 18And let no one in the field return for his cloak. ​ The city of Jerusalem will be under the dominion of the Antichrist's armies, but the enemy will not have everything going his way. The Lord says that He has two witnesses prepared for that very time: ​ 3And I will appoint my two witnesses, and they will prophesy for 1,260 days, clothed in sackcloth." 4They are "the two olive trees" and the two lampstands, and "they stand before the Lord of the earth." 5If anyone tries to harm them, fire comes from their mouths and devours their enemies. This is how anyone who wants to harm them must die. 6They have power to shut up the heavens so that it will not rain during the time they are prophesying; and they have the power to turn the waters into blood and strike the earth with every kind of plague as often as they want (Revelation 11:3-6). ​ Who Are the Two Witnesses? ​ The Scriptures do not tell us who the two witnesses are, so we are left to look at different Scriptures that give us possibilities. There are two opinions about the witnesses. Some believe the two witnesses represent the nation of Israel that cling to the Tenakh, the Old Testament, i.e., those who will not go along with the Antichrist's new world system and worship him by taking his mark upon their hand or forehead (Revelation 13:12, and 16). The other witness is the true church that walks with the Lord and also will not take Antichrist's mark. The other view is that the two witnesses are two powerfully anointed individuals chosen by God to witness to the Gospel and the Lord Jesus during the Great Tribulation or persecution. This view of the two witnesses being just two individuals is strengthened by the fact that, while these two witnesses cannot be killed for three and a half years, other believers are being beheaded because they refuse the mark: "And I saw thrones, and they sat upon them, and judgment was given unto them: and I saw the souls of them that were beheaded for the witness of Jesus, and for the word of God, and which had not worshipped the beast, neither his image, neither had received his mark upon their foreheads, or in their hands; and they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years" (Revelation 20:4). When one reads of the two witnesses, the enemies of God try as hard as they can to kill these two men, but they cannot kill them until the three and a half years of their prophesying and preaching is concluded (1,260 days or forty-two lunar months or three and a half years). Only at the end of their testimony is the beast (the Antichrist) allowed to kill them (v. 7). So, let's look at who the two witnesses could be. Scholars point first of all, to Enoch and Elijah. The reason for these two men is that the Bible tells us, "Just as people are destined to die once, and after that to face judgment" (Hebrews 9:27), there are two people in the Scriptures that have yet to die. Enoch is one: "By faith Enoch was taken from this life, so that he did not experience death: He could not be found, because God had taken him away. For before he was taken, he was commended as one who pleased God" (Hebrews 11:5). Elijah also did not die: "Suddenly a chariot of fire and horses of fire appeared and separated the two of them, and Elijah went up to heaven in a whirlwind" (2 Kings 2:11). Once to die is not always a hard and fast rule, though, for Lazarus died twice. The Lord resurrected him, and he lived on and died a second time. Elijah certainly seems to be one of them because the prophet Malachi prophesied his return before the great and terrible Day of the Lord. In the last two verses of the Old Testament, here's what Malachi wrote: 5Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and awesome Day of the LORD. 6And he will turn the hearts of the fathers to their children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers. Otherwise, I will come and strike the land with a curse" (Malachi 4:5-6). The second view is that the two witnesses are Moses and Elijah. These were the two individuals seen speaking with Jesus when Christ was transfigured before His disciples, Peter, James, and John (Matthew 17:1-8). This view also gains credence due to the miracles that the two witnesses can do. Chapter 11, verse 6, says that they will turn rivers to blood and bring plagues on the earth, which Moses did during his ministry. On three occasions, Elijah brought fire on the earth: once on Mount Carmel in a spiritual dual with 400 prophets of Baal, and twice destroying a band of fifty soldiers who had come to arrest him (2 Kings 1:9-15). In our passage in Revelation, the two witnesses destroy those who attack them with fire (v. 5) and have the power to shut up the heavens so that it does not rain for the period of their prophesying, which is something that Elijah also did (1 Kings 17:1). At God's timing, the enemy is allowed to kill them: ​ 7Now when they have finished their testimony, the beast that comes up from the Abyss will attack them, and overpower and kill them. 8Their bodies will lie in the public square of the great city—which is figuratively called Sodom and Egypt—where also their Lord was crucified. 9For three and a half days some from every people, tribe, language and nation will gaze on their bodies and refuse them burial. 10The inhabitants of the earth will gloat over them and will celebrate by sending each other gifts, because these two prophets had tormented those who live on the earth (Revelation 11:7-10). ​ At the end of the three and a half years, the beast (the Antichrist) is allowed to kill them. A festival similar to the western Christmas tradition of giving gifts begins at the two witnesses' death, showing us the world's hatred towards these men. Verse nine says that people all over the world will see their dead bodies and gloat over them. This prophetic passage could not be fulfilled until only recently. With satellite and cable T.V. everywhere, all that is happening at the temple mount in Jerusalem is broadcast live. It is interesting that, even as I write these words, I am watching a live cam focused on the Temple Mount's Western Wall in Jerusalem. ​ 11But after the three and a half days the breath of life from God entered them, and they stood on their feet, and terror struck those who saw them. 12 Then they heard a loud voice from heaven saying to them, "Come up here." And they went up to heaven in a cloud, while their enemies looked on. 13At that very hour there was a severe earthquake and a tenth of the city collapsed. Seven thousand people were killed in the earthquake, and the survivors were terrified and gave glory to the God of heaven. 14The second woe has passed; the third woe is coming soon (Revelation 11:11-14). ​ Imagine the T.V. newscasters' shock in Jerusalem, when they suddenly see the two dead bodies come back to life and stand on their feet. I think the newscasters will be awestruck and step back in fear of them. Instead, they hear a voice in heaven, calling them up. Imagine seeing the two ascending into the sky together as a severe earthquake rocks the city. No wonder the survivors will be terrified. ​ Since we are not told the identity of these two witnesses, it is possible also that they are unknowns and readied for this time. We only know that they will be invincible until their job is completed, i.e., carrying out plagues and judgments until they finally accomplish all that God has for them to do. We can say with confidence that these two witnesses appear to sum up the miraculous and prophetic ministry that has marked other periods of biblical history. These two witnesses will mark the end of an era. The window of repentance for all humanity is closing quickly; the final judgment time is swiftly approaching. ​ The Seventh Trumpet ​ 15The seventh angel sounded his trumpet, and there were loud voices in heaven, which said: "The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Messiah, and he will reign for ever and ever." 16And the twenty-four elders, who were seated on their thrones before God, fell on their faces and worshiped God, 17saying: "We give thanks to you, Lord God Almighty, the One who is and who was, because you have taken your great power and have begun to reign. 18The nations were angry, and your wrath has come. The time has come for judging the dead, and for rewarding your servants the prophets and your people who revere your name, both great and small—and for destroying those who destroy the earth." 19Then God's temple in heaven was opened, and within his temple was seen the ark of his covenant. And there came flashes of lightning, rumblings, peals of thunder, an earthquake and a severe hailstorm (Revelation 11:15-19). ​ What do you think a believer's response should be as we consider the seventh trumpet and what is to follow, i.e., God's impending wrath? ​ In the above passages, we see the twenty-four elders worshiping God, and even though there was such hatred shown to God's saints and the two witnesses, we see that justice will prevail. Those who have been active in destroying the earth (v. 18) will themselves be brought to destruction. God's temple is opened, and the Ark of the Covenant is seen to remind people that all of what He has spoken will come to pass. Mercy and judgment will be seen in the time of the wrath of God being poured out. ​ Like John the Apostle, we all have a responsibility to internalize God's Word's truths and allow it to become part of our lives. God has a plan for all of us, and if we are open, He will be faithful to show those who take up the cross, internalize it, and work out their part. Even though these are hard truths to swallow, i.e., the sweet and sour, the Lord is always in control and sovereign over His people's affairs. If you are not yet a true believer and part of this glorious salvation plan, you can be. "Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved" (Romans 10:13). How about you? Do you have full assurance in your heart, i.e., that inner witness of the Spirit that you are born-again and a child of God? Is it possible that you feel you are missing something? To be born-again of God's Spirit and enjoy peace with God, you need to repent of sin and ask Christ to come into your life and have your life's steering wheel from this time onward. Here's a prayer you could pray: Prayer: Father, I now come to You, believing that You love me and have a plan for my life. Thank You that You so loved me that You sent your Son into the world to pay the penalty for my sin, which has kept me so long from enjoying Your presence. I repent and turn away from sin and ask Christ to come and live in me and control my life. Thank You, Father, for the gift of eternal life. Amen! Keith Thomas Website: www.groupbiblestudy.com Email Address: [email protected]

Study - 13

13. War in Heaven and on Earth Revelation 12 ​ We come now to a difficult chapter that sets forth the unleashing of evil upon the earth that surpasses anything ever witnessed in history (Matthew 24:21). As we have seen before in our study of the Book of Revelation, the things that John the Apostle conveys in telling his vision are not all in sequential order. If you were watching the Book of Revelation as a motion picture film in the order that John wrote it, you would see sweeping previews and times in the story when you would have flashbacks and then move forward again. Added to this are many instances of symbolism and imagery. After studying the two witnesses' ministry in our previous study in chapter eleven, the chapter closed with the seventh trumpet (11:15). The seven bowls of wrath at the seventh trumpet's blowing are revealed to us in chapter sixteen. In chapter twelve, verses 1-6, the Spirit of God shows the big picture view of what has been taking place on earth over centuries. God's desire is for His Church to understand the underlying cause of the war in heaven and earth revealed in chapters twelve through fourteen. Often in life, we cannot see the wood because we are so close to the trees, in the same way, we need to step back to take in the whole scene as the Holy Spirit gives us in symbolic picture language nations and individuals in broad brushstrokes of history. Verses 1-6 is an overview of the unseen spiritual war between God and the forces of darkness in the world, i.e., a war for all of humanity. Simultaneously, we see two significant conflicts, one in heaven and one on earth. This theme runs from 12:1 to 14:5, focusing our attention on Antichrist's war against the people of God in the last seven years before the end of the age. One of the things that make the Book of Revelation challenging to interpret is the use of symbolism in referencing different individuals through history. Here is where we must look closely at the Scriptures to find the meaning of these symbols. In verse 1, we read of a great sign in heaven. The Greek word, sēmeion, translated in verse 1 with the word sign, carries the thought of a mark or symbol pointing to something beyond the picture. Let's try and understand what the Holy Spirit wants to show us. The Woman and the Dragon 1A great sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet and a crown of twelve stars on her head. 2She was pregnant and cried out in pain as she was about to give birth. 3Then another sign appeared in heaven: an enormous red dragon with seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns on its heads. 4Its tail swept a third of the stars out of the sky and flung them to the earth. The dragon stood in front of the woman who was about to give birth, so that it might devour her child the moment he was born. 5She gave birth to a son, a male child, who "will rule all the nations with an iron scepter." And her child was snatched up to God and to his throne. 6The woman fled into the wilderness to a place prepared for her by God, where she might be taken care of for 1,260 days (Revelation 12:1-6). ​ Contrary to popular belief, Satan is not yet a resident of hell; in fact, the Bible says that he pursues his kingdom's objectives like a prosecuting attorney before the bar of heaven, where he daily accuses the saints of God. He is not called "the accuser of our brothers and sisters" for nothing (Revelation 12:10). He is also called "the ruler of this world" (John 14:30; John 12:31-33), and in another place, "the prince of the power of the air" (Ephesians 2:2). In the Book of Job, we see him accusing Job twice before God (Job 2:1-6); this is also the case in Zechariah 3:1-2, where Joshua, the high priest, is being accused by Satan. This positional authority Satan has leads us to a big question we must look at before we can move on: ​ How did Satan get this authority to stand in heaven and accuse us before God? ​ The devil gained authority over the earth by his deception of Adam and Eve and their giving allegiance to Satan by their obedience to him. You may ask, "how did mankind end up in this situation?" Paul wrote about the principle of servitude in this way, "Don't you know that when you offer yourselves to someone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one you obey—whether you are slaves to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience, which leads to righteousness? (Romans 6:16). In the beginning, Mankind was given the responsibility to rule over all that God had made: ​ 26Then God said, "Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground." 27So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. 28God blessed them and said to them, "Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground." (Genesis 1:26-28 Emphasis mine). ​ The Hebrew word, radah, translated with our English word "rule," means to "rule over or subdue."1 God gave responsibility and authority over all of creation to Adam and his descendants. This thought of humankind given responsibility is also brought out in Genesis 2:15: "Then the Lord God took the man and put him into the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it." The Hebrew word, shamar, translated with the English words "take care of," means: "to keep, guard, protect and preserve, as a watchman cares for his cattle or sheep." Our forefather, Adam, gave away humanity's right and dominion to rule into the hands of Satan in the Fall. Humanity became dominated by the devil there in the Garden of Eden. Satan, with impunity, could say to Christ at the temptation in the wilderness, "I will give you all their authority and splendor, for it has been given to me, and I can give it to anyone I want to" (Luke 4:6). Satan was not offering Jesus something that he did not have. Christ came to buy us out from Satan's dominion: "The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil's work" (1 John 3:8). Let's look first of all at the main character symbols that we are given in this chapter: The Woman clothed with the sun (v. 1) and the moon under her feet and a crown of twelve stars is a picture of the faithful from the nation of Israel. Nations and cities are often referred to in the female gender. For instance, in America, when we sing the song, God bless America, we sing: "stand beside her, and guide her." The woman is not just the nation of Israel, but the Messianic community whose heart is for the glory of the God of Israel, viz. those whose desire is for their Messiah to take the reins of the nation and entirely rule in righteousness. Just as her God "wraps himself in light as with a garment" (Psalm 104:2), in the same manner, is the Messianic community of Israel clothed with the sun. The twelve stars may represent the twelve sons of Israel. The Enormous Red Dragon with seven heads and ten horns symbolizes our enemy, Satan (v. 9), the arch deceiver and fallen angel who is determined to corrupt and try to destroy anything that God is doing. Why are there ten horns on the dragon? We believe that, in the seventieth week of Daniel, i.e., the seven-year period, the world under the Antichrist's leadership will be represented as ten trading blocs as the Club of Rome in 1973 proposed in its report, Regionalized and Adaptive Model of the Global World System.2 Hence, the ten horns of verse 3. The ten regions are also typified by the ten toes of the last vestiges of ruling empires that dominated Israel, as shown in Daniel 2:40-45. Satan's tail sweeping a third of the stars and flinging them to earth may represent those angels that joined Satan in his rebellion against God and are active today in the unseen realm to influence humanity to turn incrementally to demonic spirits. The Male Child—the Ruler. This is a picture of the Redeemer and Messiah Jesus in his earthly birth as a man, representing man and dying as a sinless substitute in place of sinful humanity. It is He Who is destined to "rule all the nations with an iron scepter" (v. 5). The dragon standing before the woman and trying to destroy the male child speaks of the many attempts to kill the Messiah even from His birth. When three wise men from the East came to Rome's client king Herod, asking about the One born to be King of the Jews (Matthew 2:1-2), that statement did not go down well with Herod. After all, the title King of the Jews was the title he had managed to get from Caesar Augustus. The evil spirit within Herod immediately planned to kill Jesus from His birth. Herod sent his soldiers to murder all boys under three years of age in Bethlehem (Matthew 2:16-18). Satan's desire for his kingdom on earth not to be uprooted has resulted in many attempts to hinder the birth of the Messiah King, e.g., think in terms of Pharaoh's trying to kill all males in Egypt (Exodus 1:15-22). Then, Haman's plot was also to wipe out the Jewish nation before the birth of the Messiah (Esther 3). Even after Christ's substitutionary death on the cross and ascension to heaven, the enemy plotted to wipe out the Jewish people in various pogroms in Russia, Spain, and Hitler's murder of six million in Europe during the Second World War in the hope of frustrating God's plan of redemption to bring to Himself a remnant of Jewish believers as well as a multitude of Gentiles brought into the Covenant of God. At every attempt to kill Christ by Satan, the Lord Jesus was victorious and fulfilled His mission of paying the redemption price on the cross for all who trust Him. He then was caught up to heaven (v. 5). The picture symbol of the Woman, the Dragon, and the Man Child reminds believers down through the 2,000 years since the Book of Revelation was written that we are in a spiritual battle with an unseen evil at work in the world of men. In verse seven, the broad sweep of history now changes to focus on Satan's attempt to destroy the Messianic community in the second half of the seven-year period, the 1260 days. Still, she is fully protected and taken care of by her God (v. 6). ​ The War in Heaven 7Then war broke out in heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought back. 8But he was not strong enough, and they lost their place in heaven. 9The great dragon was hurled down—that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray. He was hurled to the earth, and his angels with him. 10Then I heard a loud voice in heaven say: "Now have come the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God, and the authority of his Messiah. For the accuser of our brothers and sisters, who accuses them before our God day and night, has been hurled down. 11They triumphed over him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony; they did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death. 12Therefore rejoice, you heavens and you who dwell in them! But woe to the earth and the sea, because the devil has gone down to you! He is filled with fury, because he knows that his time is short" (Revelation 12:7-12). ​ In this passage, we are introduced to the Archangel Michael and the angels with him. The scene is of a war in heaven where the Archangel Michael, "the great prince who stands guard over the sons of your people will arise" (Dan 12:1). Jude 9 calls Michael an archangel, a chief angel, and Daniel calls him a chief prince (Dan 10:13). The passage speaks of a war between Satan and his dark angels and Michael and the angels that fight with him. The dragon, Satan, loses this battle, and he and his forces are thrown down from heaven with the effect that he can no longer accuse God's people before the heavenly bar. ​ Satan and his dark angels can no longer accuse the saints before God, and they are thrown down to the earth (v. 9). How do you think this will affect the spiritual and earthly battle? What will this mean for all true believers? This writer believes this war in heaven takes place before the last half of the seven-year period begins. When Satan is thrown down, he takes possession of the Antichrist just as he did with Judas: "Then Satan entered Judas, called Iscariot" (Luke 22:3). Satan, "who leads the whole world astray" (v. 9), continues his war of deception on the majority of earth's population. This point is where we read elsewhere of great tribulation (Matthew 24:21) breaking out worldwide, beginning at Jerusalem when the Antichrist takes his seat in the temple of God and proclaims himself as God (2 Thessalonians 2:4). This time is not the wrath of God, as some think; the Scripture says that it is Satan's wrath (v. 12). This war for the souls of men has been going on for centuries. Under Satan's dominion, the whole world system is a construct of evil spiritual forces designed by intellects much more intelligent than our human minds can fathom. The world system was what John warned his readers not to love: "Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, love for the Father is not in them" (1 John 2:15). These dark spiritual entities have been weaving cultures and rulers to try to wipe out humanity's belief in a creator God who loves His greatest creation—Mankind. We must see the events in history that lead up to this point through the lens of God's story. Our education and differing cultural influences can blind us to the spiritual battle raging for millennia the world over. There are evil spirits at work in influential positions all over the world, and we will know them by the fruit of their lives, i.e., what they do as well as what they say. Here's how the Apostle John put it: 2This is how you can recognize the Spirit of God: Every spirit that acknowledges that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, 3but every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the Antichrist, which you have heard is coming and even now is already in the world (1 John 4:2-3). John writes of the victory of God's people over the dark forces allied against them. "They triumphed over him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony; they did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death" (Revelation 12:11). What does the triumph of the saints look like to you? What two weapons of spiritual warfare do they use in this triumph? (v. 11). How does that play out in practical ways in daily living? The War on Earth 13When the dragon saw that he had been hurled to the earth, he pursued the woman who had given birth to the male child. 14The woman was given the two wings of a great eagle, so that she might fly to the place prepared for her in the wilderness, where she would be taken care of for a time, times and half a time, out of the serpent's reach. 15Then from his mouth the serpent spewed water like a river, to overtake the woman and sweep her away with the torrent. 16But the earth helped the woman by opening its mouth and swallowing the river that the dragon had spewed out of his mouth. 17Then the dragon was enraged at the woman and went off to wage war against the rest of her offspring—those who keep God's commands and hold fast their testimony about Jesus (Revelation 12:13-17). John, the Apostle, writes about the dragon's attack upon the woman, pursuing her into the wilderness. Perhaps, this passage coincides with the Antichrist desecrating the newly-built temple of God and proclaiming himself as God at the mid-point of the seven-year period (2 Thessalonians 2:4, Matthew 24:15-16, Mark 13:14). Jesus warned those in Jerusalem that they should flee from the city at that time, for then there will be great tribulation. As we read in our previous study, the army of the Antichrist will seize the city of Jerusalem: "They will trample on the holy city for 42 months" (Revelation 11:1-2). This wrath against believers in Christ is, perhaps, why the Antichrist's pursuit of the Woman, i.e., the Messianic community of Israel, in their departure from Judea and Jerusalem into the wilderness. When the dragon finds himself on earth and comes to the realization that he can no longer legally accuse and weaken God's people in the heavenly realms, he tries an attack on those living for the Lord among the tribes of Israel, the Woman. Verse fourteen says that this period lasts for a time, times, and half a time—a time being one year, times being double that amount, and half a time being half a year—three and a half years, forty-two months, or 1260 days. We read that the woman was given the two wings of a great eagle that she might fly to the place prepared for her in the wilderness. This writer does not believe that we will see a great literal eagle flying overhead protecting the Woman, as in the movie "Lord of the Rings." Again, this is a picture language promise to remind the Israelite people of how God powerfully protected the children of Israel when He brought them out of slavery in Egypt: "You yourselves have seen what I did to Egypt, and how I carried you on eagles' wings and brought you to myself" (Exodus 19:4). 10In a desert land he found him, in a barren and howling waste. He shielded him and cared for him; he guarded him as the apple of his eye, 11like an eagle that stirs up its nest and hovers over its young, that spreads its wings to catch them and carries them aloft (Deuteronomy 32:10-11). Those who flee from Jerusalem "shall mount up with wings like eagles" (Isaiah 40:31). The Antichrist is just a tool of Satan from that point on; he will pour out a flood against the Messianic community (vv. 15-16). How do we interpret what is going on at this stage? A flood is a common metaphor for a tide of ungodliness and evil: "When the enemy shall come in like a flood, the Spirit of the Lord shall lift up a standard against him" (Isaiah 59:19). When the Antichrist realizes that God is watching over and protecting the Messianic community of Israel, he will turn his attention "to wage war against the rest of her offspring—those who keep God's commands and hold fast their testimony about Jesus" (v. 17). I take it that the rest of the woman's offspring are the Gentile believers all over the world who will be persecuted, and some, perhaps many, will be beheaded during the great tribulation (Revelation 20:4). It will be eternity's badge of honor to not bow down to Antichrist's image. Paul writes that all believing Gentiles (non-Jews) are grafted into the New Covenant tree of faith (Romans 11:17-24). The Jewish believers are our brothers and sisters in the Lord. Without their early depth of dedication to evangelism, the Gospel would never have crossed over from the Jewish culture into the Gentile world of all nations. When the enemy sees that he cannot destroy the Jewish Messianic community, he will turn his attention to an all-out war against their brethren, those whom the Lord has called to Himself: "those who are made holy are of the same family. So Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers and sisters" (Hebrews 2:11), i.e., believers in Christ worldwide. This war against believers in Christ is what Jesus referred to as the Great Tribulation that starts at the desecration of the temple. The wrath of Satan characterizes this war against the saints of God. He is enraged (v. 17) at all those who hold to the God of Israel. The second half of the seven-year period is not God's wrath but Satan's wrath against the Church. A war that the Body of Christ will win by not going along with worshiping the Antichrist and choosing a better resurrection in that they "did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death (Revelation 12:11). What can we learn about the promises of God and God's character from these verses? What do you think God will do for His people during this time? You have probably heard many people talk about the Book of Acts as if it were a "golden age" of the Church. Many firm believers long to experience that type of community in the Church, to see the miraculous they did, and to experience the level of reality and power in the Holy Spirit! The Book of Acts records that "with great power gave the apostles witness of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus: and great grace was upon them all" (Acts 4:33). Brothers and sisters, if this were the case back in the days of the early Church while suffering persecution, how much more will God arise and pour out His great grace and power on His people in the last days? God's grace in great measure will be there for us at precisely the time that we need it. Isaiah 60:2 tells us that the Lord will rise upon us and that His glory will be seen upon us. Just as God has watched over His people, Israel, and fulfilled His promises to her as a nation, we, as His children, will see His promises to us fulfilled. The subject of the Antichrist and his warfare against the Church is the focus of chapter 13 of the Book of Revelation, which we will look at in our next study. Before closing this study, let's think of the prayer that Jesus taught his disciples when they asked Him how they should pray: Our Father in heaven, hallowed be Your name. 10Your kingdom come, Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. 11Give us this day our daily bread. 12And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. 13And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one (Matthew 6:9-13). Addendum. To see a chart of events that take place before Christ sets up His Kingdom, click the following link: https://prewrathresources.wordpress.com/free-pre-wrath-charts/#jp-carousel-430.) Keith Thomas Email: [email protected] Website: www.groupbiblestudy.com All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version, Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984 by Biblica, Inc. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights are reserved worldwide. 1 Key Word Study Bible. AMG Publishers, Chattanooga, TN, page 1550. 2

Study - 14

14. The Rise of the Antichrist Revelation 13:1-10 In our previous study in chapter twelve of the book of Revelation, we began looking at what essentially is a series of flashbacks similar to a motion picture drama that provide us with insight into the events of the last seven years of this age. In Revelation 11:15, we read of the blowing of the seventh trumpet, beginning the wrath of God, but John does not write about the bowl's judgment until chapter sixteen. In chapters twelve through fifteen, the Lord wants to prepare His people for Satan's wrath against the saints. The Antichrist shall "wear out the saints of the Most High" (Daniel 7:25) and make war on them: "the dragon was enraged at the woman and went off to wage war against the rest of her offspring—those who keep God's commands and hold fast their testimony about Jesus" (12:17). These are believers in Christ who are on earth during the second half of the Seventieth Week of Daniel (Daniel 9:24), the time also called the Great Tribulation (Distress NIV): "For then there will be a great tribulation, such as has not occurred since the beginning of the world until now, nor ever shall" (Matthew 24:21). God's desire is for His Church to be forewarned about the events of the second half of the seven-year period that will take place against believers in Christ. He gives us this warning so that His people are aware and spiritually prepared to endure the onslaught. Knowing these things before they take place will be an encouragement amid a dark time. How do we know that this time is still ahead for all believers in Christ? After all, some believe that the Book of Revelation events happened in the first century A.D. and culminated in the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 A.D. The answer is that there has never been any person or time in history when one man has gained control of the whole earth. This man, the Antichrist, will have authority over "every tribe, people, language and nation" (Revelation 13:7). The world system ruled by Satan ("the ruler of this world," John 14:30) is preparing for the time when one man will control the whole world through decades of manipulation of the resources of the world as a whole, i.e., its currency, energy, education, food, health and drug system, armed forces, political systems, etc. Let's dive in to read what happens after the devil and his angels are cast to the earth, i.e., something we read about in our previous study in Revelation 12:13 and 17. The Beast out of the Sea 1The dragon stood on the shore of the sea. And I saw a beast coming out of the sea. It had ten horns and seven heads, with ten crowns on its horns, and on each head a blasphemous name. 2The beast I saw resembled a leopard, but had feet like those of a bear and a mouth like that of a lion. The dragon gave the beast his power and his throne and great authority. 3One of the heads of the beast seemed to have had a fatal wound, but the fatal wound had been healed. The whole world was filled with wonder and followed the beast. 4People worshiped the dragon because he had given authority to the beast, and they also worshiped the beast and asked, "Who is like the beast? Who can wage war against it?" (Revelation 13:1-4). When John the Apostle wrote what the Lord was showing him in A.D. 95, he didn't write any chapter divisions. John wrote this account as it came to him, in a swiftly flowing vision. The chapter divisions came about nearly a thousand years after he wrote. In chapter thirteen, this passage we are studying today, continues the events John describes as unfolding after Satan is cast down to earth. When Satan realizes he only has a short time (12:12) before his kingdom reign will be brought to an end, he has already prepared a man and a political structure to use as the means for one last demonic defense of his kingdom of evil. Satan has to try and stop the growth of God's kingdom throughout the world. In this final assault, Satan calls up his two prepared vessels that he can work through to exercise full dominion over the earth—an unholy trinity of Satan, seen as the dragon, the Antichrist, and another whose focus is to use religion to manipulate humanity, viz. one that theologians call the False Prophet (Revelation 13:11). We shall look at him in our next study. In verse one of chapter thirteen, we read of Satan (the dragon) standing beside the sea, and a beast comes up out of the sea. Why the sea? In Revelation 17:15, the political system of the beast, Mystery Babylon the Great, is seen sitting on many waters, interpreted by holy writ to be "peoples, and multitudes, and nations and tongues." It is our view that the Lord is showing us that the Antichrist will arise during a time of great social upheaval: "On the earth, nations will be in anguish and perplexity at the roaring and tossing of the sea" (Luke 21:25). A leader will arise out of the storm-tossed sea of Gentile nations in turmoil to take advantage of the situation to grab power, such as Adolf Hitler did in Germany's early 1930s. I believe that this will be a literal world power and a literal individual who will arise. A climate of fear will be released by the controlled media to allow this power to thrive so that the beast of a man will be allowed to control the political and world system. The Antichrist is described in verse two as having the same characteristics as the three beasts about which Daniel spoke in Daniel 7. This likely means that the Antichrist will be a composite of the preceding three kingdoms in history. Babylon was likened to a lion (Daniel 7:4), and this man, the Antichrist, will have an ability to speak great things that will sway people just as Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon did. The second beast is likened to a bear, which we know to be the Medes and Persians (Daniel 7:5), which perhaps symbolizes the Antichrist's ferocity and power. The third beast, represented by the leopard, is a picture of the Greek empire under Alexander the Great (Daniel 7:6). Perhaps, it is indicative of the speed by which his army traveled to conquer the Middle East and Western Asia in just over three years. Similarly, the Antichrist and his kingdom will have an ability to react with speed to world events. This beast has ten horns. In the Scriptures, horns are symbols of power, demonstrated in nature by animals using their horns to fight. There have been many theories put forth to interpret the ten horns throughout church history. Some commentators see these ten horns as representing individual rulers in the Roman Empire. Others have suggested that these horns represent separate countries that arose out of the Roman Empire through time. The ten horns could even symbolize ten trading blocs being created in the year 2020 with leaders over each of them such as the 3 countries of North America, calling it the North American Free Trade Union (NAFTA). This trade agreement President Trump renegotiated calling it the USMCA. There is also the ASEAN trading bloc (Association of South East Asian Nations), the European Union, the Africa Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), and others, which this writer believes will become ten trading blocs covering the whole world.1 We will not know until we see this stage finally set. We have seen the spirit of the Anti-Christ at work throughout history, arising again and again during the last several centuries. Still, in this last and final battle, the Antichrist will be revealed for who he is, i.e., the incarnation of evil who violently opposes all that is good and even God Himself. Daniel, the prophet, also wrote of a powerful beast with ten horns: A Little Horn Among Ten 7"After that, in my vision at night I looked, and there before me was a fourth beast—terrifying and frightening and very powerful. It had large iron teeth; it crushed and devoured its victims and trampled underfoot whatever was left. It was different from all the former beasts, and it had ten horns. 8"While I was thinking about the horns, there before me was another horn, a little one, which came up among them; and three of the first horns were uprooted before it. This horn had eyes like the eyes of a man and a mouth that spoke boastfully (Daniel 7:7-8). This reference to a little horn speaks of the Antichrist. Let's read more of what Daniel tells us this man will do when he comes to power. 20I also wanted to know about the ten horns on its head and about the other horn that came up, before which three of them fell—the horn that looked more imposing than the others and that had eyes and a mouth that spoke boastfully. 21As I watched, this horn was waging war against the saints and defeating them, 22until the Ancient of Days came and pronounced judgment in favor of the saints of the Most High, and the time came when they possessed the kingdom. 23"He gave me this explanation: 'The fourth beast is a fourth kingdom that will appear on earth. It will be different from all the other kingdoms and will devour the whole earth, trampling it down and crushing it (Daniel 7:20-23). ​ This more imposing little horn (the Antichrist) will wage war against the saints and defeat them (v. 21). What do you perceive is happening here? Who is spoken of here, and what does defeat look like for them? ​ This writer's opinion is that this fourth beast is represented as a remnant of the Roman Empire, which arises in a similar political form, as a ten trading bloc structure whose ten leaders will give their authority to the one called the Little Horn (Daniel 7:8). These ten trading blocs are also symbolized as the ten toes of Nebuchadnezzar's image in Daniel 2:44: "in the time of those kings, the God of heaven will set up a kingdom which will never be destroyed." It is not clear in Daniel 2:44 above what kings or leaders are mentioned, but the ten kings are symbolized by the ten toes of the image, i.e., the last stage of the fourth kingdom. The vision concludes with a Rock crashing on the image's feet and destroying Satan's series of evil empires' last vestiges. These ten leaders of nations or trading blocs will be in power when the Antichrist comes on the scene: 12"The ten horns which you saw are ten kings who have received no kingdom as yet, but they receive authority for one hour as kings with the beast. 13These are of one mind, and they will give their power and authority to the beast. 14These will make war with the Lamb (Revelation 17:12-14). To further study the thought of a ten-nation theme, you may like to view a YouTube video: If the below link is taken down, do a Google search on the topic, The New World Order - A 6000 Year History. If you start it at 1:35:38 you can watch the presenter talk about the Ten Kingdoms, found on a 1973 Club of Rome document. Here's the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9x4BySWBwos ​ The whole world will come under this fourth kingdom's power or the latter part (13:8). This writer believes that we already see this particular phase of the plan to conquer the whole earth and bring all nations under one man's control. General Wesley Clark spoke of this plan in his testimony of what he was told just after 9-11. You might want to click on the below link, or if it is taken down, do a search on YouTube putting into the Search box the words: General Wesley Clark 7 Countries. The countries mentioned by him did not have a central bank under the domination of those pulling strings in the world before 9-11. Here's the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RC1Mepk_Sw ​ Paul the Apostle wrote of this evil leader, calling him the Man of Sin (2 Thessalonians 2:3). Daniel called him the Little Horn (Daniel 7:8, 19). John the Apostle called him The Beast (Revelation 11:7), and the Antichrist (1 John 2:22). The word "Antichrist" can have two meanings: 1) It can signify one opposed to Christ, the antithesis of Christ. 2) It can also mean instead of Christ, a pretender who will paint himself as a Christ-like figure, i.e., one that will arise during dark times and set the raging sea of humanity back on its feet. When we studied the breaking of the seven seals and specifically the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, we looked at the Antichrist's rise as the first broken seal of the scroll. The Worship of the Beast The beast has one head that seemed to have a fatal wound (13:3, 14), and many believe he will die; instead, his wound is miraculously healed. The whole world was astonished (v. 3) and followed the beast. The Greek word used here, thoumazō, means "to wonder, have in admiration and marvel." The emphasis in this verse certainly seems to be when the whole world admires what this man can accomplish through his overcoming of death and his utilization of power. Passages like this are why I believe this passage and associating passages are still future. Those who are Preterists have difficulty interpreting this passage at face value. (Preterists believe that this passage was fulfilled in the first century A.D.). Rome in the first century could not make the whole world astonished at any of Rome's Caesars. This deliverance from death causes a great wonderment and a growing belief by unbelievers in Christ that the Antichrist is a god and can bypass death's claims. This healing will likely be a powerful deception and could be the lie for which many will fall: "For this reason God sends them a powerful delusion so that they will believe the lie" (2 Thessalonians 2:11). The definite article is on the words the lie, indicating that the lie he tells is a big one. With the power of technology behind him, he will be able to listen in on conversations and track people's every move with the Internet of Things (IoT). With 5G technology being introduced, your T.V.'s, phones, and many gadgets in the home listening to the words we say, the Beast will seem like a god, and one to be greatly feared. All those outside of Christ will be coerced to worship Satan and the Antichrist (v. 4) because all food will be controlled. It will be easier to compromise and give in rather than stand against him. His military and financial power will be such that people will conclude that no country can resist his might (13:4). Satan will give this man his power and authority over the whole earth (Revelation 13:2), and as Daniel 7:21 above says, he will wage war against the saints, the Body of Christ. Perhaps, many will die at his hand rather than bow the knee and acknowledge the Antichrist as God. Three of the horns, according to Daniel 7:20, will fall, which leads us to believe that three of the ten leaders of the ten trading blocs will be deposed from their positions as leaders, perhaps killed as the Antichrist gains power. We can't be dogmatic about such things, though. Let's now look at the second passage in chapter 13: 5The beast was given a mouth to utter proud words and blasphemies and to exercise its authority for forty-two months. 6It opened its mouth to blaspheme God, and to slander his name and his dwelling place and those who live in heaven. 7It was given power to wage war against God's holy people and to conquer them. And it was given authority over every tribe, people, language and nation. 8All inhabitants of the earth will worship the beast—all whose names have not been written in the Lamb's book of life, the Lamb who was slain from the creation of the world. 9Whoever has ears, let them hear. 10"If anyone is to go into captivity, into captivity they will go. If anyone is to be killed with the sword, with the sword they will be killed." This calls for patient endurance and faithfulness on the part of God's people Revelation 13:5-10). Like Adolf Hitler was able to speak charismatically under the power of the evil one,2 this man will influence many people with blasphemous words and slanderous sentences against the Lord (v. 5). I would not be surprised if one can only access the Internet's power by using an icon on their phone or device with the user's face bowing down to the Antichrist on their phone or device. Only believers in Christ will say no, which will be why the Antichrist will make war against them. To the Antichrist, there can only be one god: him. He will oppose and will exalt himself over everything that is called God or is worshiped, so that he sets himself up in God's temple, proclaiming himself to be God (2 Thessalonians 2:4). ​ Daniel the prophet continued to speak of this man and the blasphemies that come out of his mouth. ​ 24The ten horns are ten kings who will come from this kingdom. After them another king will arise, different from the earlier ones; he will subdue three kings. 25He will speak against the Most High and oppress his saints and try to change the set times and the laws. The saints will be handed over to him for a time, times and half a time. 26" 'But the court will sit, and his power will be taken away and completely destroyed forever. 27Then the sovereignty, power and greatness of the kingdoms under the whole heaven will be handed over to the saints, the people of the Most High. His kingdom will be an everlasting kingdom, and all rulers will worship and obey him' (Daniel 7:24-27. Emphasis mine). ​ Along with the blasphemies, there will be oppression of believers in Christ (v. 25). This beast of a man will change the set times and laws (v. 25). ​ What do you think the scripture means when it says he will change the set times and laws? What laws and set times do you think will be changed, and how are such things already leaning towards this time? ​ This change of the law will probably be a complete abandonment of all Christian holidays where the name of Christ could be mentioned. Laws that allow ungodly sins will be introduced, and hedonism will be practiced openly. ​ The saints being handed over to him refers to the persecution of biblical Christianity that will take place during the second half of the seven-year period, the time about which Jesus warned us, i.e., the Great Tribulation (Matthew 24:29-30). Persecution has never defeated Christianity; it has only stimulated the Church to grow deeper roots in Christ and grow numerically. I believe the Church will go through persecution, but the defeat about which the passage is talking refers to the Church losing the culture war. In Scripture, the Church, or called out ones, are called to be salt and light to the world (Matthew 5:13-16). As the days get increasingly evil, the influence of the godly upon society gets weaker. When the movie Gone with the Wind came out in 1939, Clark Gable spoke his famous "d" word to Vivien Leigh in response to her tearful question: "Where shall I go"? ("Frankly Scarlett, I don't give a damn.") It shocked the USA so much that it was front-page news. Compare that to today, and you will see how far we have been desensitized in our modern culture, which is growing increasingly darker and at a faster and faster rate. ​ Scripture also warns us of this spiritual sleep in the ten virgins' parable in Matthew 25:1-13. Even though five were wise (they took oil in their lamps) and five were foolish (and brought no oil), it records that the Bridegroom was a long time coming, and they ALL fell asleep (v. 5). When the Antichrist comes to power, this battle for our culture will intensify. Many in the Church today are asleep and unaware that they are in a spiritual battle. ​ Scripture tells us that there is coming a time when many who have a form of godliness but lack the power of a holy life (2 Timothy 3:5-7) will fall away from the faith. They will fall away because they have never been part of the true Church. To many today, going to Church is just a formal occasion for a Sunday morning. Jesus said, "At that time many will turn away from the faith and will betray and hate each other" (Matthew 24:10). Paul the Apostle also wrote about this event that will take place when many shall rebel against the faith of Christ: "Don't let anyone deceive you in any way, for that day will not come until the rebellion occurs and the man of lawlessness is revealed" (2 Thessalonians 2:3). This war against the saints will not overcome the true Church of Christ. They will stand for Christ even though they are being killed for their faith. The saints will be delivered before God pours out His wrath on a sin-loving world: ​ "for God has not appointed us to suffer wrath but to receive salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ" (1 Thessalonians 5:9). ​ Throughout history, Satan and his demons have sought the worship that is reserved for God. Demonic spirits will sometimes possess people and manifest in objects to be worshipped. Paul the Apostle wrote, "What do I mean then? That a thing sacrificed to idols is anything, or that an idol is anything? No, but I say that the things that the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to demons and not to God; and I do not want you to become sharers in demons" (1 Cor. 10:19-20). Do not fear that you will unwillingly or unknowingly take the mark of the Beast. We will talk about this more in the chapters to come. There will come a time when the Anti-Christ arises and requires sworn allegiance and servitude. You will have to make a conscious choice as to whom you will serve. Those who choose the Anti-Christ will be required to worship him as well as Satan. The Lamb's Book of Life When you think of the last days leading up to the Second Coming of Christ, what is your greatest fear? How do you think Christ would answer your concern? Whatever your fear is, you do not face it alone. Jesus said, "Surely, I am with you always, to the very end of the age" (Matthew 24:20). Don't spend time worrying about that time and how you will provide for yourself and your family. When you go on a train journey, you get your ticket before you board the train. God will give us the grace to help us in our time of need (Hebrews 4:16). Expect that God will show up in power to provide and keep us as He did the Israelites in Egypt during the ten plagues. The Lord has promised to be with us and will never leave us or forsake us (Deuteronomy 31:6). When Nebuchadnezzar threw Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego into the fiery furnace, there was a fourth One in the fire with them (Daniel 3:25). The enemy will not have everything his way; many are awakening to the cosmic war's reality being fought on earth and becoming believers. All inhabitants of the earth will worship the beast—all whose names have not been written in the Lamb's book of life, the Lamb who was slain from the creation of the world (Revelation 13:8). During the second half of the seven-year period, all of society's structure will revolve around the Beast and his mark. The whole world's commerce will have an identifying mark, which identifies each person as a worshiper of the Antichrist and a part of his system. At that time, those who are Christ's must stand in obedience to the Lord. At no other time in history will the identity of Christians be so clear. Refusing the mark will demonstrate faith in Christ. Those whose names have not been written in the Lamb's book of life will worship the Beast. God has never promised us that He will keep us from all harm (1 Peter 4:12-14). He promises that everything that happens, He will use for our good (Romans 8:28) and that nothing can separate us from Him. Nothing! Not even death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, or things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus (Romans 8:38-39). How do you know for sure that your name is written in the book of life? Have you chosen Christ and trusted Him for salvation? If you are uncertain, you can make that choice today. I would encourage you to read the linked study, How Can I Be Sure of My Faith? Here is a mystery. We choose Christ, but He also chooses us. Paul addresses the Christian believers in Ephesus, those who are faithful to Jesus Christ, in this way: 3Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ. 4For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love 5he predestined us for adoption to sonship through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will (Ephesians 1:3-5). On that great day, may you be found in Him and for us to rejoice together in the goodness of our God. Keith Thomas, Email: [email protected] Website: www.groupbiblestudy.com

Study - 3

3. Letters to Four Churches. Revelation 2:18-3:22 We are continuing to look at the letters to seven specific churches in the province of Asia in what is now South-west Turkey. In our last study, we looked at the first three: Ephesus, Smyrna, and Pergamum. Today, we look at what Christ had to say to Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, and Laodicea. The seven letters were given to the Apostle John by the Lord Jesus and were commendations and corrections to those specific churches at the time of the Revelation. They are also timeless lessons for each of us as individuals as well as to situations in twenty-first-century churches. We should have an ear to heaven and hear what the Spirit of God is saying to us (Revelation 2:29). To the Church in Thyatira 18"To the angel of the church in Thyatira write: These are the words of the Son of God, whose eyes are like blazing fire and whose feet are like burnished bronze. 19I know your deeds, your love and faith, your service and perseverance, and that you are now doing more than you did at first. 20Nevertheless, I have this against you: You tolerate that woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophet. By her teaching she misleads my servants into sexual immorality and the eating of food sacrificed to idols. 21I have given her time to repent of her immorality, but she is unwilling. 22So I will cast her on a bed of suffering, and I will make those who commit adultery with her suffer intensely, unless they repent of her ways. 23I will strike her children dead. Then all the churches will know that I am he who searches hearts and minds, and I will repay each of you according to your deeds. 24Now I say to the rest of you in Thyatira, to you who do not hold to her teaching and have not learned Satan's so-called deep secrets, 'I will not impose any other burden on you, 25except to hold on to what you have until I come.' 26To the one who is victorious and does my will to the end, I will give authority over the nations— 27that one 'will rule them with an iron scepter and will dash them to pieces like pottery'—just as I have received authority from my Father. 28I will also give that one the morning star. 29Whoever has ears, let them hear what the Spirit says to the churches (Revelation 2:18-29). Thyatira was in the middle of a valley on the road from the capital city of Pergamum, connecting Sardis and Philadelphia to Laodicea. Much commerce traveled through the town, and it had a good trade in woolen and clothing goods. Lydia, the seller of purple cloth, came from the city of Thyatira. Lydia was the first convert by the Apostle Paul in Europe when he came to Philippi (Acts 16:14). At the time of the Revelation of John the Apostle, there were many trade guilds in Thyatira so that if a tradesman was not a part of the trade guilds, he was restricted in doing business. The trade guilds often met in a temple to false gods and began their meetings with sacrifices and drink offerings and often becoming a drunken revelry. Many of the believers of Thyatira took no part in those meetings, but one among them taught that it was okay to compromise their values, viz. the woman named Jezebel. The Lord's letter to Thyatira affirmed the good He saw. He is the One who sees differently than a man sees. He who has blazing eyes of fire can pierce the depths of each man's soul and know our innermost thoughts and motivations. He also has feet like burnished bronze (v. 18), the kind of metal the Altar of Burnt Offering was made of before Solomon's temple, as well as the mirrors of the women of Israel. The Lord affirmed the church on four particular qualities He saw, their love, faith, service, and perseverance. He also noticed that they were doing more than they were at first as their love for Him grew. However, then came the reproof. They were tolerating false teaching by a woman named Jezebel, which might not have been the correct name for the woman. By calling the woman Jezebel, the Lord may have been putting before the congregation His view of the woman's distorted teaching. As the letter was read in the church, each would have known to whom He was speaking. Jezebel was the daughter of King Ethbaal, the ruler of Sidon, in present-day Lebanon. She worshiped Baal, the storm god, and married the king of Israel, Ahab. Once queen in Israel, Jezebel proceeded to introduce 800 false prophets and served Baal by leading Israel into idol worship. She was infamous because of her manipulation, intimidation, and murder tactics. King Ahab became passive and submissive to Jezebel in his leadership of Israel. When godly people rose against her, she had them killed (1 Kings 18:4). This woman in Thyatira was holding herself out to be a prophet and misleading God's people into a compromise with the idolatry of the city as well as sexual immorality (vs. 20-22). The verse, "Now I say to the rest of you in Thyatira" (v. 24), tells us that the letter was read to the congregation, and her sin was brought into the light and made manifest before the believers. She would have heard the Lord giving time and grace to repent, but there was also the warning that, if she did not repent, God would allow sickness to come, not only to her but also to those in the congregation involved with her in sin. These are strong words, but people who mess with Christ's bride and take advantage of her lack of awareness of spiritual things will be judged. False teachers should not mess with God's bride, the church. They should tie a millstone around their necks and throw themselves into the sea than to corrupt those young in the faith (Luke 17:2). His encouragement to His bride there at Thyatira was for them to hold on to their faith (v. 25). What are some of the benefits of tolerance in our culture? What are the downsides of tolerance? ​ To the Church in Sardis 3 "To the angel of the church in Sardis write: These are the words of him who holds the seven spirits of God and the seven stars. I know your deeds; you have a reputation of being alive, but you are dead. 2Wake up! Strengthen what remains and is about to die, for I have found your deeds unfinished in the sight of my God. 3Remember, therefore, what you have received and heard; hold it fast, and repent. But if you do not wake up, I will come like a thief, and you will not know at what time I will come to you. 4Yet you have a few people in Sardis who have not soiled their clothes. They will walk with me, dressed in white, for they are worthy. 5The one who is victorious will, like them, be dressed in white. I will never blot out the name of that person from the book of life, but will acknowledge that name before my Father and his angels. 6Whoever has ears, let them hear what the Spirit says to the churches (Revelation 3:1-6). The Lord pointed out that He knew the deeds of His church in Sardis, just as He knows our deeds. He spoke about their reputation, i.e., to those looking from outside the church, they looked like a lively church, but Christ knew their real spiritual condition was one of deadness. What are the qualities of a dead church? How does a church become dead? The church at Sardis was like many throughout the world today. Many people looking from the outside would see them as a lively congregation. They might have had good worship with the gifts of the Spirit in operation, but the church was just going through the motions—their heart for the things that God cared about was non-existent. Just as the five foolish virgins lacking in oil were locked out of the wedding banquet with the Lord's saying, "I don't know you" (Matthew 25:12), this church just played the part of believers; they were hypocrites—stage actors on the scene of life. The church was not going through persecution because it had become like the world. The enemy of God does not bother the church that does not oppose him. When a group of people or a church is asleep to the things of God, it would be foolish for the enemy to awaken them. Satan's strategy is to let them sleep. The Lord looked on, and His view was that their deeds were unfinished (v. 2) and lacking in the fullness that pleased Him. I have now walked with the Lord for forty-two years and been a part of many different kinds of churches on three continents of the world: in Charismatic churches, Evangelical churches, Pentecostal churches, and Baptist-leaning churches. I love the church, e.g., old and young, gifts of the Spirit, and churches that do not practice the gifts. As I am now older and wiser, I ask myself, "What are the things that show forth the life of God in a church? What does God see or not see when He finds a church with deeds unfinished or falling short?" Can I offer my opinion? Is He seeing a body of people holding forth the light of the life of God in Christ? Is Christ an emphasis among the believers? Are people growing in their discipleship and being taught the Word of God and having it explained? Are people being added to the church and excited at what they have found? It is a fact of life that only those who are mature give birth to others. Adult sheep make lambs, and when lambs come to delivery, they are taken care of by the mature sheep. If a body of believers is not reproducing, then deeds are unfinished with the Holy Spirit not given His place in the congregation. The Lord said to them to wake up and strengthen what they still had, which was slowly dying (v. 2). To the Church in Philadelphia 7"To the angel of the church in Philadelphia write: These are the words of him who is holy and true, who holds the key of David. What he opens no one can shut, and what he shuts no one can open. 8I know your deeds. See, I have placed before you an open door that no one can shut. I know that you have little strength, yet you have kept my word and have not denied my name. 9I will make those who are of the synagogue of Satan, who claim to be Jews though they are not, but are liars—I will make them come and fall down at your feet and acknowledge that I have loved you. 10Since you have kept my command to endure patiently, I will also keep you from the hour of trial that is going to come on the whole world to test the inhabitants of the earth. 11I am coming soon. Hold on to what you have, so that no one will take your crown. 12The one who is victorious I will make a pillar in the temple of my God. Never again will they leave it. I will write on them the name of my God and the name of the city of my God, the new Jerusalem, which is coming down out of heaven from my God; and I will also write on them my new name. 13Whoever has ears, let them hear what the Spirit says to the churches (Revelation 3:7-13). When an earthquake demolished the city of Philadelphia in AD 17, because of after tremors, many of the population went to surrounding areas fearing the same thing would happen again. Those who remained received rebuilding help, as did Sardis, from the emperor Tiberias Caesar. The name of the town was changed to Neocaesarea in honor of the support, but the city remained small. To receive help from others and to walk in humility is to crush the pride that seeks to elevate itself in the human heart. More than eighty years later, when the Lord called attention to the church at Philadelphia, He had no criticism for the church; instead, He affirmed them by telling them that He saw their deeds and that they had endured patiently, even though they had little strength (v. 8). They had kept God's Word and not denied His name. For their faithfulness to Him, He promised that each victorious individual would have the name of their God written on them, along with residence in the city of God, the new Jerusalem (v. 12). The Lord said that He is the One who holds the key of David, perhaps an allusion to a prophecy by Isaiah, "I will place on his shoulder the key to the house of David; what he opens no one can shut, and what he shuts no one can open" (Isaiah 22:22). This prophecy speaks of an heir to the line of David, who will be given all sovereign power and authority over the earth. His keys open all doors that seem shut. This power and authority are given to the church to exercise under Christ's leadership and direction. The city of Philadelphia was a border town of Lydia, Mysia, and Phrygia; beyond were people outside of Roman and Greek culture, i.e., Barbarians. It could be that, because Christ found nothing wrong in the church, it might be the reason that He set before them an open door. What kind of open door was He giving them? It could be an open door to take the Gospel to those cities not yet won for Christ. First, those opposing them from the local synagogue, i.e., expressing the will of Satan to destroy the body of believers, would be defeated (v. 9). How do you think Christ destroys opposition? (v. 9). What is God's way of stopping opposition to the advance of the Kingdom of God? For Saul, the man who became the Apostle Paul, his heart was changed from opposing the believers to one of working with them. I believe that his conversion came as a result of believers suffering under the Jewish persecution and crying out to the Lord in prayer. Time and again in the Scriptures, when believers cry out to the Lord in prayer, He moves in power to deliver and save His people. Think of Israel in Egypt; God came to help them when they cried out to the Lord (Exodus 2:23, Judges 3:9, 4:3, 6:7). Jesus said to the church that He had placed before them an open door. I take that to mean that from there, Christ would raise up godly men and women who would take the Gospel east and northwards. Even though they had little strength, they had the kind of endurance and love of the Word of God that God could use. The Lord doesn't need big churches to carry on His work; the reduction of the army of Gideon to 300 was a good lesson (Judges 7:2-8). When God gets the glory, even a small body of believers will have open doors given to them. Philadelphia was only a small church. He was looking for faithfulness to endure the tests He allowed them to experience (v. 10). Because they endured the attacks from the synagogue, He said He would keep them: Since you have kept my command to endure patiently, I will also keep you from the hour of trial that is going to come on the whole world to test the inhabitants of the earth (Revelation 3:10). There's a lot of controversy about this verse, for some say it speaks of the time of tribulation yet ahead for believers in the twenty-first century, but why would Jesus promise something to those in the first century that He had no intention of fulfilling? Some suggest that God will keep His faithful believers from enduring a time of tribulation by rapturing them out before it started, but there is a difference between the tribulation and the time of God's wrath. Yes, God will keep us from the time of His wrath by the catching up (rapture) of believers (1 Thessalonians 4:17), before the wrath of God comes. But like many of the believers of John the Apostle's day, we will have to experience persecution and tribulation [thlipsis-heavy crushing pressure]. It is interesting that in the passage above, the Greek word translated as "keep," tereo, does not mean "to remove," as many pre-tribulation rapture proponents would say. It means to guard against loss or injury, and comes from the root teros, which means "a watch." Author H.L. Nigro says of this verse of scripture: In fact, many Bible versions do not translate this phrase "keep you from." The New American Bible translates this "save you from"; The Living Bible translates it "protect you from"; and The Amplified Bible translates it "keep you (safe) from." In its footnotes, The New International Version explains, "The Greek for this phrase can mean either 'keep you from undergoing' or 'keep you through.'" In either case, it does not mean "to remove."[1] There are several possible interpretations of the word keep. How will the Lord keep us? It could be that, just as Israel was protected amid the ten plagues of Egypt, we may have to endure the difficulties of the time of tribulation, but God will keep and preserve His people, even though some will be martyred. Paul, the Apostle, wrote that Christ would come from heaven to rescue believers not from the tribulation and trouble of that time, but "from the wrath to come" (I Thessalonians 1:10). What doors seem shut to you that you would like God to open? To the Church in Laodicea 14"To the angel of the church in Laodicea write: These are the words of the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the ruler of God's creation. 15I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! 16So, because you are lukewarm—neither hot nor cold—I am about to spit you out of my mouth. 17You say, 'I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing.' But you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked. 18I counsel you to buy from me gold refined in the fire, so you can become rich; and white clothes to wear, so you can cover your shameful nakedness; and salve to put on your eyes, so you can see. 19Those whom I love I rebuke and discipline. So be earnest and repent. 20Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with me. 21To the one who is victorious, I will give the right to sit with me on my throne, just as I was victorious and sat down with my Father on his throne. 22Whoever has ears, let them hear what the Spirit says to the churches" (Revelation 3:14-22). We come now to the seventh church that Jesus told John to write a message. Laodicea was a church possibly founded by Epaphras (Colossians 4:12-13) situated forty-five miles southeast of Philadelphia and a hundred miles east of Ephesus. The great Roman road heading eastward from Ephesus ran right through this city, making it a center of trade, banking, and communication. A six-mile-long aqueduct supplied the city with water, but it came to them lukewarm. The Lord had nothing encouraging to say to them, only strong words of correction, basically saying that their behavior made Him nauseous and wanting to vomit. What was so offensive to the Lord? More than likely, it was their self-sufficiency and indifference toward Christ's message of the Gospel. Perhaps it stemmed from the same earthquake that struck the area in AD 17, for this city refused help from Caesar, wanting instead to rebuild the city with their own resources. Today, many have this same attitude of wanting no support from those who offer, choosing instead to stand on their own two feet and not rely on others. This attitude is modern paganism, i.e., that of self-expression and self-reliance. The Laodicea attitude was one of "I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing" (v. 17). However, the Lord saw them as wretched, pitiful, poor, blind, and naked (v. 17). What an indictment! These kinds of people do not feel their need for God; they think they can do quite well on their own. There are churches today that propagate this false religion of being all that you can be by utilizing the power of self. Instead of reliance on God and His resources, ungodly men are planning on rebuilding humanity to escape their physical weakness. This evil plan is utilizing new technology to create a new human species with the human brain connected to a central hub of knowledge via a brain interface. This new form of technology is commonly called Transhumanism and abbreviated as H+ and will be used to enhance human intellect and physiology and significantly to overcome human weakness. Satan made this promise in the beginning, "You shall be as gods" (Genesis 3:5), all apart from walking in dependence on God. Even though the Lord saw them in this condition, in verse twenty, we see the loving-kindness of God as the Savior comes to us and knocks on the door of our hearts, refusing to give up on those far from Him. When people are blind, they cannot even see the door whereon Christ is knocking. We need the servants of God to lead us by the hand to the doorway. Can you today think of this writer as one leading you in your blindness to the door so that you can hear the One whose heart longs for you? There is no one like Christ, for who has ever heard of a God who goes in search of the ones He loves? All religions are humanmade philosophies of man doing his best to climb to God by his own energy. Christianity is the Creator God coming down to us in the person of His Son to make the way for us. He is the Great Shepherd of the sheep searching for the lost of His flock (Matthew 18:12-14). Verse twenty tells us that He will not force His way upon us but graciously waits for us to open the door at His knocking and sit down to a meal with us. It is a picture from the book of Song of Solomon, where the Lover stands at the door of the house of His beloved and asks to come in (Song of Solomon 5:2). The greatest picture of intimacy was to sit and eat together face to face. "If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with me" (v. 20). In New Testament times, there were three meals a day, breakfast was akratisma, little more than bread. There was ariston, a picnic snack by the sidewalk or wherever one happened to be at the time, and lastly, there was deipnon, the evening meal, the main meal of the day where people lingered over it at the end of their days work.[1] Christ used this word to call the Laodiceans and us to Himself. How gracious is our God to want to linger with us and enjoy our intimate fellowship, just like He did with Abraham (Genesis 18:1-8) and Moses (Exodus 24:9-11). The Lord's counsel to the Laodiceans was for them to buy eye salve from Him and have their eyes opened from their blindness (v. 18). We also in the twenty-first century should ask of God for His eye salve to open our eyes to the depths of deception slowly and incrementally descending on us. If you find yourself today tempted to trade eternity with God for riches, fame, self-sufficiency, and technological enhancement—don't do it! Turn your heart to the living God and ask for Christ to deliver you of this world's traps. Ask the Lord to come into your life and rule and reign over you.

Study - 7

7. The Fifth Seal and Great Tribulation Revelation 6:9-11 In our previous study, The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, we looked at the first half of a seven-year period spoken of by Daniel the prophet (Daniel 9:27), that as the first four seals of a scroll are opened (Revelation 5), there will be four effects upon the Earth. Jesus also spoke about these effects in His talk with His disciples on the Mount of Olives in Matthew 24. The Lord said the events were signs that would precede His Second Coming and that before His coming, there would be a time of persecution of believers: 9"Then you will be handed over to be persecuted and put to death, and you will be hated by all nations because of me. 10At that time many will turn away from the faith and will betray and hate each other" (Matthew 24:9-10). This time of persecution is similar to what happens at the opening of the fourth seal. The persecution continues into the fifth seal but now with the martyrdom of believers in Christ taking place. At the opening of the fifth seal in Revelation 6:9-11, we read of God's servants crying out to Him for judgment to fall on those who are murdering believers in Christ: The Fifth Seal 9When he opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain because of the Word of God and the testimony they had maintained. 10They called out in a loud voice, "How long, Sovereign Lord, holy and true, until you judge the inhabitants of the earth and avenge our blood?" 11Then each of them was given a white robe, and they were told to wait a little longer, until the number of their fellow servants and brothers who were to be killed as they had been was completed (Revelation 6:9-11). The fifth seal will bring persecution and martyrdom (v. 9) of Christ-followers who have been faithful to the Word of God and their testimony as believers. I do not believe that God is the instigator of the persecution of believers. He sometimes allows it, but He is not the architect of it, so how can some teachers say that the opening of the seals is the wrath of God? God has not appointed believers to go through wrath (1 Thessalonians 5:9), and He is not the author of the persecution of His people. If the opening of the fifth seal brings an effect on believers that is not the wrath of God, then why would the first four seals be the wrath of God? At the opening of the fifth seal, we read of martyred believers asking God how long they must wait before the Lord avenges their blood (Revelation 6:10). Why would they be crying out for God to bring justice and judgment if the wrath of God is being poured out during the breaking of the scroll seals, as some believe? It is my persuasion that God's judgment and vengeance have not yet started. Author Charles Cooper, in an online article, writes: The martyrs of seal five specifically ask God (O Sovereign Lord), "How long before you will judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth?" (Rev. 6:10, ESV). The NASB frames the question this way: "How long...will You refrain from judging and avenging our blood on those who dwell on the Earth?" Bratcher and Hatton, in A Handbook on the Revelation of John, suggest, "Please don't wait any longer to condemn and punish those people on earth who killed us," correctly reflects the sense of the question, (Bratcher, R. G., & Hatton, H. A Handbook on the Revelation to John ((1993), p. 116)). Taken at face value, the question of the martyrs can only mean that no evidence of God's wrath occurs prior to the fourth seal.1 In our next study, we will see that at the opening of the sixth seal, the wrath of God is imminent: ​ 16They called to the mountains and the rocks, "Fall on us and hide us from the face of him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb! 17For the great day of their wrath has come, and who can withstand it?" (Revelation 6:16-17). It is when we come to the seventh seal that the trumpet judgments start. Until then, we do not read of any painful consequences on the wicked that are destroying the Earth and murdering believers in Christ. That which is happening at the fifth seal is the wrath of Satan against God's people. God is not yet pouring out His wrath; it is Satan using the Antichrist to persecute the saints, something we are told about in Revelation 12: ...But woe to the Earth and the sea, because the devil has gone down to you! He is filled with fury, because he knows that his time is short... 17Then the dragon was enraged at the woman and went off to wage war against the rest of her offspring—those who keep God's commands and hold fast their testimony about Jesus (Revelation 12:12; 17). In Revelation 12:12 and 17, we see Satan cast down to the Earth by Michael and his angels (12:6) and a war erupting against the elect of God, the body of Christ. The prophet Daniel also prophesied about the Antichrist waging war against the saints and defeating them: "I beheld, and the same horn made war with the saints, and prevailed against them" (Daniel 7:21). The fifth seal ties in with the warning by Jesus to His disciples on the Mount of Olives of a time of Great Tribulation (KJV) or Great Distress (NIV) in Matthew 24. This period will be a time when believers in Christ will be slain because of their stand for the Word of God and the testimony they have maintained. It is not the wrath of God being poured out. When God's wrath begins, Antichrist will not be enjoying everyone calling him a god and sitting in the Temple of God (2 Thessalonians 2:4), he will be looking for a cave to hide from the wrath of God (Revelation 6:16). The Great Tribulation is the wrath of Satan against God's elect because they do not conform to Antichrist's desire to be worshiped! Great Tribulation Begins at the Antichrist's Desecration of the Temple There is a shift from the general overview of the timeline at verse fifteen of Matthew's Gospel, where the Lord transitions to talking about the need for specific care at the midpoint of the seven-year period mentioned by Daniel the prophet (Daniel 9:27). This shift or change from a general overview is indicated using the words, "So when," or in another English translation, the term "therefore" is used. Let's read Jesus' words of warning: 15"So when you see standing in the holy place 'the abomination that causes desolation,' spoken of through the prophet Daniel—let the reader understand— 16then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains. 17Let no one on the housetop go down to take anything out of the house. 18Let no one in the field go back to get their cloak. 19How dreadful it will be in those days for pregnant women and nursing mothers! 20Pray that your flight will not take place in winter or on the Sabbath. 21For then there will be great distress [thlipsis], unequaled from the beginning of the world until now—and never to be equaled again (Matthew 24:15-21). Jesus warned us of an event He called the Abomination of Desolation, i.e., a desecration of the temple by the Antichrist (Matthew 24:15, 21), that would precipitate a time of Great Distress or Great Tribulation on Earth. The prophet Jeremiah also talked about it: "How awful that day will be! No other will be like it. It will be a time of trouble for Jacob, but he will be saved out of it (Jeremiah 30:7). Paul, the apostle, also wrote of desecration of the temple by the lawless one (the Antichrist) in 2 Thessalonians 2:4. ​ Some Bible teachers say that Christians will not have to go through this time of great tribulation, believing that it is God's wrath poured out, and believers will not experience God's wrath (1 Thessalonians 5:9). This writer believes that, at the midpoint of the seven-year period, the time of wrath has not yet started and what we call the Great Tribulation or Great Distress is a time of persecution. Let's look at how the Greek word, thlipsis, is used in the New Testament and understand what the gospel writers were communicating. What is the Great Tribulation or Great Distress? The word tribulation (KJV) or distress (NIV) is the translation of the Greek word thlipsis. My Hebrew Greek Key Word Study Bible tells me that this Greek word means: "To crush, press, squeeze. It means tribulation, trouble, or affliction. Thlipsis conveys the picture of something being crushed, pressed or squeezed as from a great weight. It is used to denote grievous physical affliction or mental and spiritual distress."2 Not once is it described as a time of wrath from God. This Greek word occurs 20 times in the New Testament. Of those 20 times, the term is descriptive of trouble and difficulties that the believer variously goes through on his journey in life. For instance, when Jesus was teaching the Parable of the Sower, He said that we should expect tribulation or affliction as thlipsis is translated in the following passage: 20"The one on whom seed was sown on the rocky places, this is the man who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy; 21yet he has no firm root in himself, but is only temporary, and when affliction [thlipsis] or persecution arises because of the word, immediately he falls away (Matthew 13:20-21). Great is my confidence in you; great is my boasting on your behalf. I am filled with comfort; I am overflowing with joy in all our affliction [thlipsis] (2 Corinthians 7:4). It is correct to believe that God does not pour out His wrath on His people. However, God's people have always gone through tribulation, and He has warned us about this so that we do not fall away during this time. People that believe in a Pre-Tribulation rapture rely heavily on interpretation and will always offer scriptures that talk about God's wrath as if the seven-year period (the 70th Week of Daniel) is the wrath of God. God wants us to understand that we will not go through or have to suffer His wrath, but what does He tell us about tribulation? Historically speaking, this doctrine is pretty new to the Church. We do not see evidence of people teaching this particular doctrine before the 1830s. Many great men of God believed that the Church would endure the Great Tribulation, men such as John Wesley, Charles Wesley, Charles Spurgeon, Matthew Henry, John Knox, John Hus, William Carey, John Calvin, Isaac Newton, George Whitfield, A.B. Simpson, George Mueller, John Newton, Jonathan Edwards, John Wycliffe, John Bunyan, and many others.3 There are only five times in the New Testament when the Greek word thlipsis is used in an end-times prophetic sense. Twice in Matthew's gospel, twice in Mark's gospel, and once in the Book of Revelation. So let's take Matthew's warning about this time first. ​ 21For then there will be great distress [thlipsis], unequaled from the beginning of the world until now—and never to be equaled again (Matthew 24:21). ​ 29"Immediately after the distress [thlipsis] of those days "'the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from the sky, and the heavenly bodies will be shaken' (Matthew 24:29). ​ because those will be days of distress [thlipsis] unequaled from the beginning, when God created the world, until now—and never to be equaled again (Mark 13:19). ​ 24"But in those days, following that distress [thlipsis], "'the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; 25the stars will fall from the sky, and the heavenly bodies will be shaken.' 26"At that time people will see the Son of Man coming in clouds with great power and glory. 27And he will send his angels and gather his elect from the four winds, from the ends of the Earth to the ends of the heavens (Mark 13:24-27). ​ Some say that when Jesus was talking about gathering His elect, He wasn't talking to us Gentile believers; He was talking to the Jews. But at the very end of the gospel of Matthew, he records Jesus as saying to His disciples to go and "...make disciples of all nations and to teach them to obey all that I have commanded you" (Matthew 28:19-20). All of what Christ taught them, they were also to teach others. He didn't tell the disciples not to teach the Gentiles about the end-time prophetic events because it didn't apply to them. Also, right at the end of Mark's words about the tribulation/distress, the Lord adds the warning to stay awake and not to sleep spiritually, then He adds the words, "What I say to you, I say to everyone: Watch! (Mark 13:36-37). It's almost like He knew that some would say that these words were not for believers. The fifth time the Greek word thlipsis is used concerning the end-times is spoken about as happening during the Great Tribulation. I said to him, "My lord, you know." And he said to me, "These are the ones who come out of the great tribulation [thlipsis], and they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb (Revelation 7:14). The Great Distress or Great Tribulation will be a time of testing that God will use to deepen believers in their faith in Christ and bring maturity and fullness to the Body of Christ. It will also be a time when many come to Christ as they are awakened out of spiritual slumber. This persecution by the followers of the Antichrist will be targeted towards those who hold to the God of the Bible, both Jews, and Christians. The Antichrist will be a satanically motivated individual who desires to have the whole world worship him and get behind his agenda. He will seek to control people through control of food, laws, education, the health system, the government, religion, etc. We live in a time of full-spectrum spiritual warfare against those who serve the God of the Bible. This time will bring a period of distress and the falling away, rebellion or apostasy of many who have never been serious about their faith in God. The Antichrist will force people to worship him by setting up an image of himself in the temple of God in Jerusalem, a temple that has not yet been built, but Paul the apostle said that it would be: 3Don't let anyone deceive you in any way, for that day will not come until the rebellion occurs and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the man doomed to destruction. 4He will oppose and will exalt himself over everything that is called God or is worshiped, so that he sets himself up in God's temple, proclaiming himself to be God (2 Thessalonians 2:3-4 Emphasis mine). The Greek word highlighted above and translated as rebellion means to apostatize or fall away from the faith. It also has the direct article that tells us that it is the rebellion, a significant event that will cause a world-wide departure from biblical Christianity and the Lord Jesus. Those who fall away are those who maybe go to church but have never come into a relationship with Christ. These people are typified as the five foolish virgins in the Parable of the Ten Virgins in Matthew 25. There is the possibility that this falling away might happen when many are required to take the Mark of the Beast to be a part of the new one-world system. Part of accepting this mark will be the acknowledgment of the Antichrist to be god. Many will compromise their faith in the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob when confronted with taking the Mark of the Beast. Let's look more closely at this persecution. ​ Hatred by the World System Toward Followers of Christ ​ All those who serve the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (Jews and Bible-believing Christians) will suffer persecution and, in some cases, will die at the hands of God's enemies. We are amid a spiritual war that is taking place on planet Earth. When an unfortunate situation arises, many so-called Christians will compromise and turn away from the faith (v. 10), especially if they have to take their medical shots, or show their papers to the grocery store, or to flash their mark. Those who are half-hearted Christians will be tempted by Antichrist to betray true believers, more than likely because there may be a price on the heads of believers. There may be some who are so in debt and having no work that they are tempted to give up Christians for the snitch money to get food. Just as true Bible-believing Christians were hauled off to prison along with Jewish people during the Second World War by the Nazis, so there will be an outbreak of hatred towards true Christians and Jews alike sometime in the future. Satan and the occult motivated the Nazis, and it is the same in our day and the days ahead. There is an occult dimension to the Antichrist and his world kingdom, just as there was in the Nazi party. Believers will be betrayed and hated by those that today we may consider friends or even family: 21"Brother will betray brother to death, and a father his child; children will rebel against their parents and have them put to death.. 22You will b hated by everyone because of me, but the one who stands firm to the end will be saved (Matthew 10:21-22). Those that stand firm (v. 22) at that time are believers, so the word saved should be translated as delivered. The Greek word translated into English with the word saved means "deliver out of danger and into safety; used principally of God rescuing believers from the penalty and power of sin and into His provision of safety." I believe we will be delivered by being caught up to be with the Lord. How terrible will it be for some of us to be betrayed by our unbelieving family members? Does this mean that some of us will be hiding from those seeking us out and that members of our family will hand us over? Some might suggest that the above passage was fulfilled in the persecution that broke out after the stoning of Stephen in the Book of Acts, chapter 8, verse 1. However, it is evident from other passages that the Great Tribulation or persecution is still ahead of us because this persecution will happen during a time when one man will rule every tribe, people, language, and nation. The "He" in the below passage speaks of the Antichrist: ​ 7He was given power to make war against the saints and to conquer them. And he was given authority over every tribe, people, language and nation. 8All inhabitants of the Earth will worship the beast—all whose names have not been written in the Lamb's book of life, the Lamb who was slain from the creation of the world. 9Whoever has ears, let them hear. 10"If anyone is to go into captivity, into captivity they will go. If anyone is to be killed with the sword, with the sword they will be killed." This calls for patient endurance and faithfulness on the part of God's people (Revelation 13:7-10). ​ Jesus encourages us that, when the time comes, He requires us to be faithful and endure -even to death if need be. Death is never the end of a believer. It is but a doorway into eternal life. These words of Jesus should encourage us if we are those alive during the time of persecution. If we see these things happening on the Earth, we know that the time is not far off. We shall soon see Him coming in great power and glory to receive us to Himself (Matthew 24:30-31). ​ What Should We Do When We See the Abomination of Desolation? ​ If you find yourself alive and well on planet earth during Antichrist's time, how will you respond to the persecution? What should be your primary objectives? ​ If you are in Jerusalem, Jesus warns to get out of the city right away (Matthew 24:15-28). However, for those of us who are in different places all over the world, as far as I can see, we have three choices to make: ​ 1) Take up arms against those who seek to enslave the saints and want us to bow to Antichrist. Some would say that those aware of what is happening should leave the cities for camps devoted to armed extremism. These will likely be the first to experience the wrath of Antichrist. He will waste no time in sending drones with missiles and dropping bombs on gatherings of people that resist his will. During this time, we will all have to make decisions as to what to do. Should we defend ourselves? Thank God for those in the Second World War who rose to fight against the tyranny of the Nazis. In the Upper Room, Jesus told the disciples to prepare for what would happen in the Garden of Gethsemane by arming themselves: ​ 36And He said to them, "But now, whoever has a money belt is to take it along, likewise also a bag, and whoever has no sword is to sell his coat and buy one... 38They said, "Lord, look, here are two swords." And He said to them, "It is enough"(Luke 22:36, 38). ​ In another place, though, we are encouraged not to fight back in times of persecution. Jesus said, "But I tell you, Do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if someone wants to sue you and take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well. If someone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles (Matthew 5:39-41). Each of us must ask for grace and wisdom for whatever situation we are placed in. In the Book of Acts, we read of the disciple, Stephen. When he was persecuted, he responded with gracious words to those stoning him to death: "He fell on his knees and cried out, "Lord, do not hold this sin against them" (Acts 7:60). Such words were what influenced the Apostle Paul, then named Saul (Acts 7:57). Dying and going to be with the Lord with Christ's word on your lips can affect many people. ​ 2) The second option is to leave the cities and retire to farmland and try and survive. How will that work? If we take, as an example, the city of Cincinnati, Ohio, how many Bible-believing, Jesus-loving people would there be who would seek to get away to hide in the surrounding countryside? Could we say that there are two million people in the greater Cincinnati area? What would happen if 100,000 believers were trying to find places of refuge all at the same time? How would that look? With heat-seeking cameras and RFID transmitters to sort out those with the mark and those without, we will have great difficulty in hiding. ​ 3) The third option is to wait on the Lord and get His specific direction, trusting Him to show us what to do. When thinking of that period, we often forget that God is waiting for us to depend on Him amid dark times so that He may show Himself strong on behalf of His church (2 Chronicles 16:9). He delights for us to lean upon Him in such times of need. Though the enemy will seem to be having his way, the power of the Lord will be upon His people. We will receive help from the Lord: ​ 33"Those who are wise will instruct many, though for a time they will fall by the sword or be burned or captured or plundered. 34When they fall, they will receive a little help, and many who are not sincere will join them. 35Some of the wise will stumble, so that they may be refined, purified and made spotless until the time of the end, for it will still come at the appointed time (Daniel 11:33-35). ​ The closer we get to the end-time, the more significant will be the darkness and evil, but at the same time, the greater the light and power will be on true believers (Isaiah 60:1-2). The gifts of the Spirit will be more evident in those days. Bible-believing churches that teach what is going on will be shut down with true believers going underground in small groups or house churches. We should start to gather into Christian communities now, for we will need to know whom we can trust in the last half of the seven-year period. ​ We will also have to be wholly disconnected from any computer, cell phone, or electronic devices. Communication with other believers will not be through any digital devices. Even our cars can be tracked through the RFID on all new vehicles and the tires. If we were to use any connecting device, it would broadcast our exact position. In the future, there will be no ability to buy things via cash, and we will likely be disallowed to use the Internet because we don't have the Mark of the Beast. All money will be cashless and only transferred from buyer to seller with a digital device, which can only be accessed by those who have the Mark of the Beast. ​ Those of us who decline to take the Mark of the Beast might have to use a bartering system. We will know when the time comes. God will not leave us in the dark. Part of the Mark may be an RFID chip, i.e., a signature/authorization chip that will allow you to buy or sell via the stores, mobile phone, or the Internet. It will have all your personal information on it, and it will somehow detect whether or not you had worshipped the beast when you came online. Once people have taken the Mark, they are bound to worship Satan and his Antichrist. If a person has taken the Mark and changes his mind and refuses to worship the Antichrist's image, he will be killed: ​ The second beast was given power to give breath to the image of the first beast, so that the image could speak and cause all who refused to worship the image to be killed (Revelation 13:15). ​ We who refuse the mark will need to have food, either growing or in storage, to last how long we don't know, for we know that the Lord will intervene and cut short the time (Matthew 24:22) by catching up believers before the second half is over. (We don't know the day or the hour of His coming). There will be no cash to buy things for true believers, so we will have to trust and lean on one another. We must also remember that a time of famine broke out when the third seal was opened. We must learn to depend on the Spirit of Christ and His power and to receive direction before the time of famine comes at the third seal, which is some time in the first three and a half years, i.e., the time of the beginning birth pains (Matthew 24:7-8). I do not know everything about this time ahead, but one thing I do know. Scripture says that believers will overcome the Antichrist. We will overcome him by the power of the finished work of the shed blood of Christ, and by the word of testimony of our experience of Christ: ​ 10Then I heard a loud voice in heaven say: Now have come the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God, and the authority of his Christ. For the accuser of our brothers, who accuses them before our God day and night, has been hurled down. 11They overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony; they did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death. 12Therefore rejoice, you heavens and you who dwell in them! But woe to the Earth and the sea, because the devil has gone down to you! He is filled with fury because he knows that his time is short (Revelation 12:10-12). ​ How do you think God will shine through His saints in the last days? Amid persecution, why do you think people will be drawn to Christ and His Church? ​ Our destiny is to be married to our heavenly bridegroom Who is preparing us to be powerful agents of His kingdom. The testing process may be a difficult one for some. Still, there will come a day, Christ assures us when we will stand and receive heavenly rewards and enter eternal life in close relationship with the lover of our souls, the Lord Jesus Himself! ​ I saw thrones on which were seated those who had been given authority to judge. And I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded because of their testimony about Jesus and because of the word of God. They had not worshiped the beast or its image and had not received its mark on their foreheads or their hands. They came to life and reigned with Christ a thousand years (Revelation 20:4). ​ What an awesome day that will be! Your joy will know no bounds if you are a believer in Christ! We will see His face and enjoy Him and one another forever and ever. That experience of His presence will be worth the fire of testing!

Study - 8

8. The Sixth Seal Cosmic Disturbances Revelation 6:12-17 In our last two studies, we have been looking at chapter six of the Book of Revelation, starting with the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse and our previous study, The Fifth Seal and Great Tribulation. Today, we look at what happens on earth at the opening of the sixth seal. The Lord is revealing to us a time in the future, a seven-year period spoken of by the prophet Daniel (9:27), in the middle of which an event called the "Abomination of Desolation" takes place, i.e., a desecration by the Antichrist of a newly built temple in Jerusalem, Israel. The Fifth seal and Matthew's Gospel tells of a time of great distress or tribulation that occurs after that desecration takes place. Paul the Apostle states that part of this desecration is when the Antichrist will seat himself in the Temple of God, proclaiming himself as God and demanding worship from people all over the world (2 Thessalonians 2:4). During that period of tribulation, there will be various events taking place, e.g., fire from heaven, the two witnesses, and an angel preaching (Revelation 14:6). We will examine those events in greater detail as we study further in this book. Before we read what happens at the opening of the sixth seal, let's look more into the events described as occurring during the Great Tribulation or Distress, i.e., the preceding signs about which Jesus warned His disciples on the Mount of Olives. Jesus warned that the situation on earth would look very bleak: ​ If those days had not been cut short, no one would survive, but for the sake of the elect those days will be shortened (Matthew 24:22). ​ The Great Tribulation, Distress, persecution, and martyrdom of God's people will be cut short of the entire three and a half years. This Greek word (koloboó), translated into English with the words cut short means to maim or amputate or cut something short of its expected length. The expected time of three and a half years after the Abomination of Desolation will be cut short by the intervention of the Lord on behalf of those who are in covenant relationship to Him by His sacrificial death on the cross. Then will begin the wrath of God. We don't know how long the Church all over the world has to endure this tribulation or persecution before it is cut short by the intervention of the Lord. Jesus went on to warn us about some other things happening during the Great Tribulation: ​ 23At that time if anyone says to you, 'Look, here is the Messiah!' or, 'There he is!' do not believe it. 24For false messiahs and false prophets will appear and perform great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect. 25See, I have told you ahead of time. 26"So if anyone tells you, 'There he is, out in the wilderness,' do not go out; or, 'Here he is, in the inner rooms,' do not believe it. 27For as lightning that comes from the east is visible even in the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. 28Wherever there is a carcass, there the vultures will gather (Matthew 24:23-28). ​ The words "At that time" (v. 23) is the Lord showing us that He was talking chronologically of what happens during that time. We are to guard our hearts against those who will try to deceive us perhaps by suggesting that earth was seeded from supernatural beings from another world, something that is often pushing by the New Age prophets. There is an agenda behind the supernatural signs purporting to come from aliens or beings from another universe. These will be demonic spirits seeking to deceive, if it were possible, even the elect of God (v. 24), the Body of Christ (the true Church). We must not listen to those who claim to be prophets, telling us that the Lord Jesus has landed in some foreign country. The Lord made it very clear that, when He comes, every eye on the planet will see Him. His coming will brighten the darkness of the time, and there will be no doubt Who Christ is when He comes. Verse 28 speaks of wherever moral corruption is taking place there will be vultures (judgment) gathering. Let's now concentrate on the chronological timeline revealed to us as happening at the opening of the sixth seal, for before Christ's coming there will be cosmic signs: The Sixth Seal Opened 12I watched as he opened the sixth seal. There was a great earthquake. The sun turned black like sackcloth made of goat hair, the whole moon turned blood red, 13and the stars in the sky fell to earth, as late figs drop from a fig tree when shaken by a strong wind. 14The sky receded like a scroll, rolling up, and every mountain and island was removed from its place (Revelation 6:12-14). Are these cosmic signs a result of elite leaders tampering with the earth's atmosphere, or could they be the last warning from God to the unrepentant that the Lord is about to intervene? Could both of these things be true? What do you think? Cosmic signs begin to happen as the sixth seal is broken, which leads us to ask three questions about what causes these cosmic signs to occur in the future. At this point in history, we might not be able to understand these events before they take place, but we can be "watchful" and have our eyes open and our hearts prepared as we see end-time events unfold, knowing that Jesus warned us that these things would take place. 1) Are the cosmic signs the result of the leaders of the earth reaping what they have sown? In the 1950s and 1960s, the US government tested more and more powerful nuclear weapons deep down under the earth's surface. Since then, several countries have done likewise. Can new, more powerful tests cause a great earthquake or seismic activity? Then there is the geo-engineering of the upper atmosphere as chemicals (chemtrails) are sprayed to "reduce global warming." The Lord warned us centuries ago about a time that is now here when the planet itself will be "defiled" by its people: 4The earth dries up and withers, the world languishes and withers, the heavens languish with the earth. 5The earth is defiled by its people; they have disobeyed the laws violated the statutes and broken the everlasting covenant. 6Therefore a curse consumes the earth; its people must bear their guilt (Isaiah 24:4-6). What could be referred to as "the laws and statutes that have been disobeyed" by scientists and evil leaders of the earth? It would be wise to consider just one of the projects that our leaders have spent more money on than the whole of the US space program. I'm talking about the vast Large Hadron Collider or CERN, as it is often called. It is humanity's largest particle collider, and it is a circular, 17-mile-long (27 kilometers) tunnel, 300 hundred feet under the French-Swiss border, ringed by magnets. The magnets accelerate streams of particles (usually protons, sometimes other things) to enormous speeds, then crash them into one another. Scientists study the splattered remains of those collisions, where unusual particles sometimes emerge, to search for as-yet-unseen building blocks of the universe. At the moment of writing (June 2020), the most significant human history project is on break until the Spring of 2021. They are looking for the building blocks of life itself, i.e., how creation started and what holds it together, but what they have been finding is strange paranormal phenomena and apparitions. Ghosts and demonic spirits have manifested. Outside the main building is a statue to a Hindu god by the name of Shiva, a dancing god of destruction. In one of the experiments, when they collided these particles together, the observers saw things that made them very scared. Steven Hawking, the famous theoretical physicist, who was not a Christian, had concerns about this project and made his views known. He warned the hundreds of particle physicists that they were opening Pandora's Box, and once it was opened, we will not be able to put back in what comes out. Here's what he wrote in his book: "The Higgs potential has the worrisome feature that it might become metastable at energies above 100bn gigaelectronvolts (GeV). This could mean that the universe could undergo catastrophic vacuum decay, with a bubble of the true vacuum expanding at the speed of light. This could happen at any time and we wouldn't see it coming." [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kk0Ax6Mlw4w https://www.nbcnews.com/mach/science/huge-new-atom-smasher-would-be-world-s-biggest-far-ncna959071 The darkening of the sun and the moon turning blood-red could also be the result of air pollution caused by nuclear explosions on earth's surface during what happens as the second seal is opened—war. In nuclear explosions, vast amounts of dust rise into the upper atmosphere as during the atomic blasts in Hiroshima and Nagasaki when the light of the sun was blocked out.[2] What about the stars falling? What did John see when he described the stars falling to earth? I always wondered how the stars in the sky could fall to the earth, but John could be seeing showers of asteroids hitting the planet. There is also another theory which, I believe, ties in with what is happening at this point. The prophet Isaiah wrote: ​ 19The earth is broken up, the earth is split asunder, the earth is thoroughly shaken. 20The earth reels like a drunkard, it sways like a hut in the wind; so heavy upon it is the guilt of its rebellion that it falls—never to rise again. 21In that day the LORD will punish the powers in the heavens above and the kings on the earth below. 22They will be herded together like prisoners bound in a dungeon; they will be shut up in prison and be punished after many days. 23The moon will be abashed, the sun ashamed; for the LORD Almighty will reign on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem, and before its elders, gloriously (Isaiah 24:19-23). ​ If a person were standing in the evening at any point on earth, looking at the horizon, the planet tottering on its axis (v. 20) would appear as if the stars were falling from the sky. The psalmist says that it is God who steps in not to cause the cosmic disturbances but to stop the movement of the earth on its axis: When the earth totters, and all its inhabitants, it is I who keep steady its pillars (Psalm 75:3 ESV). What a terrible and awesome experience it will be to stand on earth while this is happening! This passage in Isaiah, chapter 24, leads us to the second possibility as to what causes the cosmic signs: 2) Are these cosmic signs supernatural manifestations taking place in the heavenly realms as Michael the Archangel casts down Satan and evil angelic forces to the earth? In the passage above, verse 21 says that the Lord will punish the powers in the heavens above and the kings on the earth below. This reminds us of the invisible powers of darkness: "For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms' (Ephesians 6:12). Job 38:7, Revelation 1:20, and Isaiah 14:12 liken angels, both evil and good, as stars. Could this reference to the stars being thrown down in our passage in Revelation be a reference to Satan and his angels being cast down? We cannot be dogmatic about such things, but it is possible, for we are told of such a thing happening in Revelation 12. Let's look at that passage: 7Then war broke out in heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought back. 8But he was not strong enough, and they lost their place in heaven. 9The great dragon was hurled down—that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray. He was hurled to the earth, and his angels with him. 10Then I heard a loud voice in heaven say: Now have come the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God, and the authority of his Christ. For the accuser of our brothers, who accuses them before our God day and night, has been hurled down. 11They overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony; they did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death. 12Therefore rejoice, you heavens and you who dwell in them! But woe to the earth and the sea, because the devil has gone down to you! He is filled with fury because he knows that his time is short (Revelation 12:10-12. Emphasis mine). When these demonic forces are cast down, it is terrible for earth's occupants, for Satan knows that he has little time (v. 12) to muster forces against the coming of the Lord. These cosmic signs are also spoken of as happening just before the Day of the Lord begins, as told in Matthew and Mark's Gospels. Matthew writes in accord with the Book of Revelation about cosmic signs in the sky, saying that after the distress (thlipsis) of those days and the appearance of the cosmic signs, He would send His angels and gather together His elect from all parts of the globe. This gathering by the angels can only be the snatching up of God's people, commonly called the rapture: ​ 29Immediately after the distress of those days, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from the sky, and the heavenly bodies will be shaken. 30At that time the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky, and all the nations of the earth will mourn. They will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky, with power and great glory. 31And he will send his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of the heavens to the other (Matthew 24:29-31). ​ After several cosmic signs at the opening of the sixth seal, the angels will gather together the elect (everyone that is born again of God, John 3:3), and they are all seen in heaven before the throne (v. 31, Revelation 7). 3) The third possibility as to the cause of the cosmic signs could be that the wrath of God is beginning to be released on the earth. We have already seen that, at the opening of the fifth seal, those believers who were martyred cried out to God for Him to bring judgment on those who are murdering believers, but they are told by God to wait a bit longer. It is possible that these cosmic signs in the sky are one last warning to earth's inhabitants before the final seal is opened and the back to back event of the rapture and the wrath of God begins to be poured out for the rest of the seven-year period. Bible teacher Charles Cooper, in an online article, writes: "The prophet Joel promised that the Day of the Lord (the eschatological wrath of God) begins after the unique portents in the sky and on earth occur. The grouping of these unique events occurs in Revelation 6:12-14 and are specifically named as such. No other occurrence of this unique set of events appears in the book of Revelation. The portents indicate that the out-breaking of God's wrath is imminent. It is difficult to understand why John would put the indicator of God's imminent wrath five seals later than its actual beginning [If there was a pre-tribulation rapture]. The idea that God's wrath will begin imperceptibly and build to a great climax is an invention of theological necessity without a biblical base." [3] Panicked Anticipation of the Wrath of God 15Then the kings of the earth, the princes, the generals, the rich, the mighty, and everyone else, both slave and free, hid in caves and among the rocks of the mountains. 16They called to the mountains and the rocks, "Fall on us and hide us from the face of him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb! 17For the great day of their wrath has come, and who can withstand it?" (Revelation 6:15-17). In your own words, share about whom you think the passage is talking as hiding from God? All who have rejected the gospel begin to look for caves in mountains to hide in—why? From whom are they hiding? They are hiding from their Creator, the Lord God Almighty, Who sits upon the throne, but they are also hiding from the wrath of the Lamb. The wrath of the Lamb is a paradoxical statement, for we don't normally associate anger and wrath from a Lamb (v. 16). Many people make the mistake of thinking that Jesus would never bring them into judgment. They have always believed in a meek and mild Savior. They don't anticipate that this same Jesus will be "revealed from heaven with his mighty angels 8in flaming fire, inflicting vengeance on those who do not know God and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. 9They will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might" (2 Thessalonians 1:8-9). These panicked people have lived their lives in rebellion against God and refuse to repent, and now they would rather die than bend the knee to the Lordship of Christ, for every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord (Philippians 2:11). What an insult to the One who offers the children of man a complete pardon. The judgment of them shall be terrible: 26If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left, 27but only a fearful expectation of judgment and of raging fire that will consume the enemies of God. 28Anyone who rejected the law of Moses died without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses. 29How much more severely do you think someone deserves to be punished who has trampled the Son of God underfoot, who has treated as an unholy thing the blood of the covenant that sanctified them, and who has insulted the Spirit of grace? 30For we know him who said, "It is mine to avenge; I will repay," and again, "The Lord will judge his people." 31It is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the living God (Hebrews 10:26-31). ​ ​ It is a dreadful and fearful thing to fall into the hands of the Living God (v. 31), and this has been the problem with humanity from the beginning in the Garden of Eden when Adam and Eve hid from the Lord. Sin will always cause us to hide from our Creator. The only way to deal with sin is to acknowledge our sin, turn from it, and receive the forgiveness of the Lord (1 John 1:8-9). If we stay in our rebellion and will not bring our sin into the light, our hearts become hardened against the Lord, and we run from His presence, but there is no place to hide from the Lord. He sees all and knows all. At the breaking of the sixth seal and the cosmic signs, the enemies of God acknowledge that they have refused the substitutionary sacrifice for their sin, and now, at the breaking of the seventh seal and the rapture of God's people, the wrath of God and the Day of the Lord will begin. The wrath of God didn't start years previously, as pre-tribulation teachers would have us believe. God's Word says that it starts at the breaking of the seventh seal and right after the cosmic signs. In the diagram above, I had to put the arrow symbolizing the rapture somewhere, but no man knows the day or the hour that Christ will come for those who have entrusted their lives to Jesus. We don't know at what stage in the second half of the seven years the catching up or rapture will occur. I believe that Jew and Gentile born-again believers will appear together before the Father in heaven at the same time before the throne. There are not two churches, i.e., one composed of Jews or even two Gentile Churches, one going to heaven before others left on earth. I do not give any credence to the End Times view as described in the Left Behind series of books, no matter how many books are sold. Jew and Gentile together are made spotless because of the blood covenant Jesus instituted at the cross of Calvary. Believers in Christ are without blame before our God, and He will wipe away our tears (Revelation 21:4). How does one prepare internally for the coming of the Lord and for whatever believers may have to experience in the Last Days? Think in terms of preparing your heart, your values, and your habits. Discuss. Our God will not allow us to go through anything that He will not go through with us. He will sustain us and give His grace for whatever is ahead for the saints. There is a story that comes to mind that was told by Corrie Ten Boom that illustrates this point. Corrie was a Dutch woman whose father owned a watch shop in Haarlem, Holland when World War II broke out. This Christ-like family began providing "hiding places" for persecuted Jews. She lived through many trials and persecution when her family went to a concentration camp because of the help they offered to the Jews. At one point, Corrie was afraid and did not think she could handle what was ahead. Her father asked her, "Corrie, when you and I go to Amsterdam, when do I give you your ticket?" She replied, "Why, just before we get on the train." "Exactly!" he replied. "And our wise Father in heaven knows when we are going to need things. When the time comes that you need strength, you will look into your heart and find the strength you need, just in time. God will give you what you need at the moment you need it." We are not to be fearful concerning the things that we have read. God has given us His Word is that He wants to reveal these things to us so that, when we see them, we know we are approaching the glorious end. We know who wins! He comes to bring justice, peace to the earth, and healing for all creation. The whole creation groans, awaiting His coming. Even so, come Lord Jesus! ​ Prayer: Father, I thank You that you have chosen me and called me Your child. Whatever trials I may go through, please give me Your enabling power and grace that I may glorify You with every decision I make. Please mold and shape my character to be all that You want me to be. Amen. This Bible study is one of many studies in the Book of Revelation. ​ Keith Thomas Email: [email protected] Website: www.groupbiblestudy.com ​ All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version, Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984 by Biblica, Inc. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. 1 https://www.themarysue.com/stephen-hawking-god-particle/ 2 https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/hiroshima/article35881700/

Study - 9

9. 144,000 Sealed from Israel Revelation 7:1-8 We have been looking at chapter six in our last three studies in the Book of Revelation, starting with the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Then, we looked at The Fifth Seal and Great Tribulation, and lastly, we looked at The Sixth Seal Cosmic Disturbances. Today, our focus is on what happens after the cosmic signs of the sixth seal, i.e., a continuation of events at some point during the second half of the seven-year period prophesied by the prophet Daniel (9:27). The fifth seal and Matthew's Gospel tells of a time of great distress or tribulation that occurs after the desecration of the temple in Israel (Matthew 24:15; and 21). Paul the Apostle also wrote about this desecration, saying that it happens when the Antichrist seats himself in the Temple of God, proclaiming himself as God, and demands worship from all the world (2 Thessalonians 2:4). This temple desecration will begin a time of distress for all believers in Christ who will not worship the Antichrist. The time of distress continues until cosmic signs take place after which the Lord intervenes by sending His angels to gather His elected ones who will not bow the knee to Antichrist: ​ 29Immediately after the distress of those days, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from the sky, and the heavenly bodies will be shaken. 30At that time the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky, and all the nations of the earth will mourn. They will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky, with power and great glory. 31And he will send his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of the heavens to the other (Matthew 24:29-31). ​ Does the Book of Revelation also talk of a gathering of God's elect after the cosmic signs? Yes! Revelation 7:1-8 tells of the specific sealing of 144,000 people from the tribes of Israel and, at the same time, the gathering of a great multitude from all nations, tribes, and tongues throughout the whole world (Revelation 7:9-17). We will look at the great multitude before the throne of God in our next study. For this study, we will just look at the 144,000 sealed from Israel. ​ 144,000 Sealed From Israel 1After this I saw four angels standing at the four corners of the earth, holding back its four winds so that no wind would blow on land or sea or any tree. 2And I saw another angel ascending from the east, with the seal of the living God. And he called out in a loud voice to the four angels who had been given power to harm the land and the sea: 3"Do not harm the land or sea or trees until we have sealed the foreheads of the servants of our God" (Revelation 7:1-3). ​ We are explicitly told of the actions of five angels. Four are holding back devastating winds of destruction at the four quadrants of the world, while another tells them to wait until "we" have sealed the foreheads of God's servants. I take the "we" (v. 3) to be other angels who are sent to gather true believers in Christ from Israel and the nations of the world, just as we are told in Matthew 24:31. In accordance with what Jesus is instructing His disciples on the Mount of Olives, after several cosmic signs at the opening of the sixth seal, the angels gather together the elect (everyone that is born-again of God), and they are all seen in heaven before the throne. Revelation 7:1-8 tells us of the specific sealing of 144,000 people from all the tribes of Israel. ​ 4And I heard the number of those who were sealed, 144,000 from all the tribes of Israel: 5From the tribe of Judah 12,000 were sealed, from the tribe of Reuben 12,000, from the tribe of Gad 12,000, 6from the tribe of Asher 12,000, from the tribe of Naphtali 12,000, from the tribe of Manasseh 12,000, 7from the tribe of Simeon 12,000, from the tribe of Levi 12,000, from the tribe of Issachar 12,000, 8from the tribe of Zebulun 12,000, from the tribe of Joseph 12,000, and from the tribe of Benjamin 12,000 (Revelation 7:4-8). What do you think is the significance of the "sealing of the foreheads?" Do you see this as a physical marking or something that is a symbol of something spiritual, or both? What is the significance of the number 144,000? We can only speculate and discuss. This sealing of believers in the Messiah happens at the same time as a great multitude of Gentiles are caught up to the throne of God (Revelation 7:9). Nowhere in Scripture are we told that these 144,000 Jews are evangelists going around the world and winning a great multitude of Gentiles, as some teachers say. It goes against what God has told us that all of us have the responsibility to take the Gospel to all nations. There should not be a hint that the responsibility is removed from the Gentiles and given to the Messianic Jews to do the job. This teaching that the 144,000 are evangelists from the tribes of Israel is an assumption by those who believe in a rapture before the seven-year period, teaching for which there is no scriptural basis. So, who are these 144,000 from Israel? God is letting us know that He has not forgotten His promises to Israel. Messianic believers from the nation of Israel took the Gospel to us Gentiles under times of great persecution, and God will not forget their faithfulness and will bring forth a remnant from the house of Israel. Chapter seven goes along with what we read in Matthew 24:29-31, i.e., that the rapture will take place after the cosmic signs and before God's wrath begins. The great multitude is made up of believers of all nations, Jews and Gentiles. We are told explicitly of 144,000 Jewish people sealed as part of the Church. I presume this to mean that they have responded to the call of God and are included in the Elect of God, the Church, i.e., the called-out ones (the Greek word translated as " church " means called-out ones). As of January 2019, there were 200 Jewish Messianic congregations in the land of Israel, numbering around 20,000 Messianic believers that have endured persecution at the hands of Orthodox Jews. At this moment in time (June 2020), are we seeing God beginning a great work of calling the 144,000? The numbers of Jews coming to Messiah Yeshua may be an indication of the soon-coming of the Lord. We don't know at what time the Lord will come, but we do know that, at the time of the end of the age, Scripture tells us there will be 144,000 Jewish Messianic believers who have responded to the call of Messiah and have the seal of God upon them. 3"Do not harm the land or the sea or the trees until we put a seal on the foreheads of the servants of our God." 4Then I heard the number of those who were sealed: 144,000 from all the tribes of Israel (Revelation 7:3-4). This same seal is placed on all believers, Jew, and Gentile when they come to Christ. Paul wrote, In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the Gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit (Ephesians 1:13). And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption (Ephesians 4:30 Emphasis mine). What is a seal? A seal is a mark of ownership and protection similar to the signature on documents today. A king or ruler had a signet ring with his symbol on his finger, which he put into hot wax to seal a document. Such a seal was placed on the tomb of Jesus (Matthew 27:66). To whomever the seal belongs, that person has the authority behind him to bring any legal action to whatever was sealed. More than six hundred years before Christ, God brought judgment on Israel for all the idolatry occurring in the Jerusalem temple. He had a mark put on the foreheads of those who were spared from the judgment: 3Then the glory of the God of Israel rose from above the cherubim, where it had been, and moved to the threshold of the temple. And He called to the man clothed in linen who had the writing kit at his side. 4"Go throughout the city of Jerusalem," said the LORD, "and put a mark on the foreheads of the men sighing and groaning over all the abominations committed there." 5And as I listened, He said to the others, "Follow him through the city and start killing; do not show pity or spare anyone! 6Slaughter the old men, the young men and maidens, the women and children; but do not go near anyone who has the mark. Now begin at My sanctuary." So they began with the elders who were before the temple. 7Then He told them, "Defile the temple and fill the courts with the slain. Go forth!" So they went out and began killing throughout the city. 8While they were killing, I was left alone. And I fell face down and cried out, "Oh, Lord GOD, when You pour out Your wrath on Jerusalem, will You destroy the entire remnant of Israel?" 9He replied, "The iniquity of the house of Israel and Judah is exceedingly great. The land is full of bloodshed, and the city is full of perversity. For they say, 'The LORD has forsaken the land; the LORD does not see.' But as for Me, I will not look on them with pity, nor will I spare them. I will bring their deeds down upon their own heads" (Ezekiel 9:3-10) Peter the Apostle wrote: "For it is time for judgment to begin with God's household; and if it begins with us, what will the outcome be for those who do not obey the gospel of God?" (1 Peter 4:17). Many of us long for justice and for sin to be judged, but God first disciplines those He loves (beginning at the house of God). We must introspectively look at ourselves before we pray for God's judgment to come. Those spared from the judgment in the Ezekiel passage were marked with a sign that they are to be saved. The Apostle Paul wrote that the Holy Spirit seals all believers to the Day of Redemption (Ephesians 4:30), and of course, this is what we read happening to 144,000 Jews in our passage in Revelation. After telling us of the work of redeeming a body of Messianic believers, Christ instructed John the Apostle to write also of a great number of believers taken from the Gentiles: "a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and before the Lamb" (Revelation 7:9). The big question before many is how come there is only 144,000 from Israel when Paul wrote that all Israel would be saved? ​ About whom was Paul speaking when he said, "All Israel will be saved?" Some believe that the 144,000 is a symbolic number because, they say, Paul the Apostle wrote that all Israel would be saved: ...and in this way all Israel will be saved. As it is written: "The deliverer will come from Zion; he will turn godlessness away from Jacob (Romans 11:26). What did Paul mean when he wrote that all Israel would be saved? Was he saying that all Jews in the nation of Israel will come to Christ, or is he saying that God has not given up on the people of Israel and will call to Messiah 144,000 out of the nation of Israel? This writer questions that the whole nation of more than eight million will be saved because Paul writes elsewhere that only a remnant will be saved: "And Isaiah cries out concerning Israel: 'Though the number of the sons of Israel be as the sand of the sea, only a remnant of them will be saved'" (Romans 9:27). We must ask what Paul could be referring to when he said that all Israel would be saved? The seemingly contradictory passages are found in Paul's letter to the church at Rome. In trying to understand why Paul seems to be contradicting himself, we need to examine why Paul wrote his letter to the church at Rome in the first place. When He wrote to the Corinthian church, it was to correct many attitudes of the flesh going on there. When Paul wrote to the Thessalonians, it was to adjust many of their false assumptions as to what would happen in the end-times. When he wrote to the Galatian church, it was to correct the false teaching by the "Judaizers," who wanted the Gentiles to be circumcised and to keep the Law of Moses. So, what was the reason Paul wrote his letter to the church at Rome? Author Peter Tsukahira helps us here. In his book, God's Tsunami, Tsukahira writes: The problem in Rome was a conflict between Jewish and Gentile believers over their respective places in leadership. Perhaps, this problem developed when the Jews who planted the church in Rome were expelled under Emperor Claudius [Acts 18:2]. Later, when they were able to return, the new Gentile leaders did not accept them back as equals since most of the congregation was by then Gentile, and Israel as a nation had rejected Jesus as Messiah. Paul heard about this growing conflict and the division between Jewish and Gentile believers, so he wrote to correct it.[1] It is possible that, because Paul had not planted the church, he started his letter by clarifying the Gospel he preached so that the Roman church would accept his recommendations to go forward with Jews and Gentiles in leadership. He writes in Romans 2:17-29 about those who call themselves Jews: 28For no one is a Jew who is merely one outwardly, nor is circumcision outward and physical. 29But a Jew is one inwardly, and circumcision is a matter of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the letter. His praise is not from man but from God (Romans 2:28-29). In other words, he's saying that just being a Jew ethnically will not qualify one for eternal life. Further on, Paul writes his treatise of Abraham's faith, i.e., that Abraham was justified with God, apart from keeping the Law and trusting his works. He writes: 16That is why it depends on faith, in order that the promise may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all his offspring—not only to the adherent of the law but also to the one who shares the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all, 17as it is written, "I have made you the father of many nations" (Romans 4:16-17). The New Covenant spoken of by Jeremiah (31:31) is based on faith in the substitutionary work of the author of salvation, the Lord Jesus, the same faith that Abraham had (Genesis 15:6). By the time Paul got to chapter nine, he was ready to write the real reason for his letter, i.e., that Jewish believers should not be excluded from leadership positions in the church because God will fulfill His calling to the Jewish people. He shared a vital thought in chapter nine when he writes: 6But it is not as though the word of God has failed. For not all who are descended from Israel belong to Israel, 7and not all are children of Abraham because they are his offspring, but "Through Isaac shall your offspring be named." 8This means that it is not the children of the flesh who are the children of God, but the children of the promise are counted as offspring (Romans 9:6-8) What is Paul saying here? Who are the children of Abraham? To what does "children of the promise" refer? A partial hardening has come to Israel. Paul carries on his thoughts on the rejection of Jesus by the majority of Jewish people, telling us that God's plans are for many Gentiles to be brought into the New Covenant along with a remnant from Israel. The natural branches, the Jewish people, would be broken off until a specific time arrives, a time when the pleroma of the Gentiles has come in: 24For if you [The Gentiles] were cut from a wild olive tree, and contrary to nature were grafted into one that is cultivated, how much more readily will these, the natural branches [believers from the nation of Israel], be grafted into their own olive tree! 25I do not want you to be ignorant of this mystery, brothers, so that you will not be conceited: A hardening in part has come to Israel, until the full number [pleroma] of the Gentiles has come in. 26And so all Israel will be saved, as it is written: "The Deliverer will come from Zion, He will remove godlessness from Jacob" (Romans 11:24-26). I am using the NIV translation which translates it as full number. I believe this translation to be incorrect. The Greek word pleroma is better translated as fullness as in the ESV, KJV, NKJ, and NASB Bibles. Paul is saying that there will come a time when Gentiles who received the faith initially from Jews have come to full adulthood biblically (fulness) in their understanding, they will reach out to the Jewish people and make them jealous of their relationship to God through faith: Again I ask: Did they stumble so as to fall beyond recovery? Not at all! Rather, because of their transgression, salvation has come to the Gentiles to make Israel envious (Romans 11:11 emphasis mine). When Paul writes that all Israel will be saved, he is talking about the true Israel, i.e., all who have placed their faith in the New Covenant given to Israel (Gentiles as well as Jews), and are grafted into the olive tree of faith (v. 24). The natural branches about which Paul writes are ethnic Jews who have had their eyes opened to Who Jesus is, viz. the Messiah of Israel, and have placed their faith in Him. I contend that, when Paul wrote about all Israel being saved, he said that there would be one body, i.e., one bride of Christ, composed not only of Jewish believers but also Gentiles, too. All Israel means those who are called to the faith of Abraham. I remind you also of Paul's letter to the Church at Ephesus: 11Therefore remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh, called "the uncircumcision" by what is called the circumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands— 12remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. 13But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. 14For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility 15by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, 16and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility. 17And he came and preached peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near. 18For through him we both have access in one Spirit to the Father. 19So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, 20built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, 21in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. 22In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit (Ephesians 2:11-22). God is at work in the nation of Israel, using true biblical believers among the Gentiles to break down the dividing wall of hostility (v. 14) between Jews and Gentiles so that Jewish people might finally see that their Messiah is for all who will walk in the faith of Abraham. Josephus, the Jewish historian of the time, wrote about the partition wall separating the Court of the Gentiles from the Court of Israel, it had a limestone sign which was found in Jerusalem in 1871, with the words, NO FOREIGNER IS TO GO BEYOND THE BALUSTRADE AND THE PLAZA OF THE TEMPLE ZONE. WHOEVER IS CAUGHT DOING SO WILL HAVE HIMSELF TO BLAME FOR HIS DEATH WHICH WILL FOLLOW [2] Jesus came to give access into the very Holy of Holies, tearing down the veil between God and man, but also the separation walls between Jew and Gentile (v. 18). We are all one in Messiah Jesus. The whole structure of the spiritual Body of Christ is being joined together (v. 21), and Jews, Arabs, and Gentile believers from all over the world are flowing together as one. What a beautiful testimony of God! 7Know then that it is those of faith who are the sons of Abraham. 8And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preached the Gospel beforehand to Abraham, saying, "In you shall all the nations be blessed." 9So then, those who are of faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith (Galatians 3:7-9). Then, there is also what Paul wrote to the church at Ephesus: This mystery is that through the Gospel the Gentiles are heirs together with Israel, members together of one body, and sharers together in the promise in Christ Jesus (Ephesians 3:6). ​ The Gospel has always been for the Jew to experience first, and then the Gentiles. It will be the same at the rapture of the saints: ​ For I am not ashamed of the Gospel, because it is the power of God that brings salvation to everyone who believes: first to the Jew, then to the Gentile (Romans 1:16). ​ There at the throne of God, we see people from every tribe from all over the world, including the twelve tribes of Israel: ​ 9After this I looked and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and in front of the Lamb. They were wearing white robes and were holding palm branches in their hands. 10And they cried out in a loud voice: "Salvation belongs to our God, who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb." 11All the angels were standing around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures. They fell down on their faces before the throne and worshiped God, 12saying: "Amen! Praise and glory and wisdom and thanks and honor and power and strength be to our God for ever and ever. Amen!" (Revelation 7:9-12). Notice that the Lord has said that every nation will be represented as standing before the throne. He doesn't exclude Israel. All believers are sealed and together will stand as one body before their Messiah. None are lost who have come under the New Covenant. All are given the opportunity, and every nation, tribe, people, and language will be clothed in white before the Lord. What a great day that will be. I hope to see all those that read these words standing with us at the throne of God. Keith Thomas Email: [email protected] Website: www.groupbiblestudy.com [1] Peter Tsukahira. God's Tsunami. Printed by Peter Tsukahira. www.Gods-Tsunami.com, pages 53-54. [2]