Revelation 13, when I stood upon
the sand of the sea and saw a beast rise up out of the sea, having
seven heads and 10 horns, and upon his horns 10 crowns, and
upon his heads the name of blasphemy. And the beast which I saw was
like unto a leopard, and his feet were as the feet of a bear,
and his mouth as the mouth of a lion. And the dragon gave him
power and his seat and great authority. And I saw one of his
heads, as it were, wounded to death, and his deadly wound was
healed. And all the world wondered after
the beast. Now, there's a lot of speculation
about who this first beast is. There's two beasts revealed,
as we read in this chapter. Some say the governments of the
world are the beast. Some say it's the Roman Catholic
Church, and so on. There's a lot of different speculation.
What we know for sure is it came out of the people. The sea signifies a multitude
of people, the peoples of the earth. If you read Revelation
chapter 17, which we won't take time to look at tonight, but
if you want to jot that down and look at it later, it tells
us how these heads and crowns are spoken of also and what they
signify, but also the seas are used, the waters. are used to
describe people. And so this creature came out
of the people of the earth and bears the name of blasphemy on
his heads. The dragon or Satan gives him
his power. And of course, God gives Satan
his power. So it ultimately all comes from
God. But we saw where he gets his authority and his seat, his
power, from Satan himself, the dragon. And verse five tells
us he speaks blasphemy against God. Now, there's not that many
things this could mean. And so there's really no reason
to speculate about it. When you look at the description
of this creature, it could actually be anybody. It could be anybody
in this world. This is all of our nature. And
so that's what I believe it is, it's anybody. It's all people,
it's us, it's everybody. It's the evil nature of all of
mankind. It's the spirit of Antichrist
that hates God and dwells in every human by nature. So it
could signify false religion, but the second beast I believe
is more is more than likely talking specifically more about false
religion. I believe this is the world,
the anti-Christ human nature of this world. But the idea of
governments may not be entirely wrong because think of it this
way, this is evil that has authority. There's a lot of evil in this
world, but nobody cares about it. It's just the way people
are. This is evil in authority. And so it could well mean governments. the governments of this world.
I know there's a saying, power corrupts and absolute power corrupts
absolutely. And there's a lot of truth to
that. But the truth of the matter is that power doesn't corrupt.
We're corrupt by nature. Power just gives us the ability
to express the corruption that was already in us. It gives us
the ability to exert that corruption on others and oppress others
with it. But that seems to be the idea
here. But if you think about it, it's
very limited as to what it could be. God has a few enemies, and
this is clearly one of them. It may be the governments of
the world, it may just be everybody by nature. But we know so much about it
that it doesn't really matter specifically what it is, does
it? It's the principle that we're seeing here the opposition to
God that's important here, and how God is opposed by this creature,
the word beast we saw means creature. But it doesn't matter too much specifically
what this refers to, because it can apply to all of those
that hate God. It can easily apply, and so it
probably refers to all who hate God, and speak against Him. and are ruled and controlled
by Satan, given what authority they do have by Satan, who is
given his authority by God. And so this beast sounds horrible
and scary, and you know, religion likes to make movies about this
kind of stuff and try to scare people into joining the church
and giving them their money. But there's something wrong with
this beast. He's wounded. He's not indestructible. He's vulnerable. He's been badly
wounded. One of his heads has been destroyed. And I believe that may well refer
to how the Lord Jesus was said from the very beginning that
he would crush the serpent's head. And of course that includes
and involves those who are in cahoots with the serpent himself. But we're warned in the scripture
now to be aware, to be sober, to be vigilant. Sometimes a wounded
threat is the worst threat. And so this beast is wounded
and he's swift as a leopard, strong as a bear and fierce as
a lion. and so not to be taken lightly.
It's very simple how we're to look, there's two ways to look
at, oh, you know, this beast is terrible and scary and frightening.
And yes, that's true. This world is a horrible place.
And it's a horrible place, not because, you know, the world,
we just happen to be in an evil world. We happen to be the evil
that's in the world. That's why the world's a bad
place because of us. We are the bad place. We are
the evil that's in this world by nature. But the other way to look at
this is in Christ, we don't have anything to be afraid of. We're
helpless against this beast by ourselves, but we're not by ourselves. I don't wanna be by myself. So
I tell you this, don't try to make war with him. Verse four,
look at verse four. And we'll read several verses
together again. And they worshiped the dragon which gave power unto
the beast. And they worshiped the beast
saying who is like unto the beast. Now they worship in Satan and
those who speak for Satan or are in positions of authority
by Satan. And this is not though, what
you would typically call a devil worshiper. You know, there's
a random meager little groups of people that say they're devil
worshipers and they do all this weird stuff, dress in black and
kill birds and stuff. That's not what this is talking
about. Not what this is talking about. These are people that
would never, if you ask them, do you worship the devil? They
would be so offended by that. They'd look like you slapped
them upside the head if you asked them that question, but they
are. They are worshiping the devil.
They're worshiping antichrist, which is not a person. It's a
spirit. It's a nature that has existed for a long,
long time. Not just a person that's gonna
rise up in the end times, like most religion teaches. But let's
go on reading. Who is like unto the beast, they
said. They worshiped the beast, saying, who is like unto the
beast and who is able to make war with him? Well, that's a
good question. Not me. I'm not able to make
war with him. I don't recommend it. But I'll
tell you who is able. You know that, don't you? And
there was given unto him a mouth, speaking great things and blasphemies. This is somebody that has a platform.
to say things that are evil and anti-Christ and godless and to
deceive people. You know, the false preacher
that's out in the woods somewhere preaching free will religion
is not really this guy. This is not, this is a spirit,
although he's included in that, everybody that speaks against
God is included in this, I believe, but this is, This is spiritual
wickedness in high places, is what I believe Paul called them,
in high places. The power was given unto him
to continue 40 and two months, verse five. In verse six, he
opened his mouth in blasphemy against God, to blaspheme his name and his
tabernacle and them that dwell in heaven. And it was given unto
him to make war with the saints and to overcome them. And power
was given him over all kindreds and tongues and nations. And
all that dwell upon the earth shall worship him." Again, how
many times have we seen that all doesn't mean what people
say it means? They say, well, all means all,
yeah. It does, it means all kinds of people, because not everybody
is gonna worship him, whose names are not written in the book of
life. All that dwell upon the earth,
but with this exception, if you're in God's book, and look what
it's called. Oh, we may just come back to
verse eight before this is over with, and I wanna talk about
just this general passage here. But look at it, whose names are
not written in the book of life of the lamb slain from the foundation
of the world. What a book. That's a book of
everybody that was redeemed by God's lamb that was slain without
beginning or end. If any man have an ear, let him
hear. Hear that, hear that. Now, anyone who sees this world,
just a little bit even, the way God sees it, knows what this
passage is talking about. This is this evil world. It's
a perfect description of this world. They worship the dragon,
they worship those that worship him. They make war, they're given
a mouth, and they speak great things and blasphemies. The power is given to them to
continue for a while. And he opens his mouth in blasphemy
against God. That's not just false preachers.
I think we're getting to that part. That's everybody. I hear blasphemy on TV all the
time. I hear it on the news. I hear
it from my neighbor. I hear it everywhere I go. I
hear it in the grocery store, blasphemy. I see it in churches
whenever sometimes I make the horrible mistake of turning over
to the wrong channel for a little while. Blasphemy. To blaspheme his name, his tabernacle,
and them that dwell in heaven. And it was given unto him to
make war with the saints and to overcome them. Not to destroy
them now, that's not possible. The elect can't be deceived.
They're not gonna be deceived but overcome in this sense, what
are you gonna do about it? What are you gonna do about what's
happening to this world right now? You're helpless against
it. And clearly God is not ready
just yet to put an end to it, or he would have. So what are
we gonna do? We're gonna talk about that. and all that dwell upon the earth.
Power was given him over all kindreds and tongues and nations
and all that dwell upon the earth shall worship him whose names
are not written in the book of life of the Lamb slain. It's
just so clear, this is the world right now. How would you better
describe it? This world is satanic. And they worship Satan and those
who belong to Satan. They worship themselves. They're
pawns of Satan. This world's stupidity is stunning,
isn't it? It's absolutely stunning. They
call boys girls and girls boy. They call evil good and good
evil. And it's just evident. And they're
blatant with it. Demanding that which results
in their own destruction. Stunning. Try to legitimize that
which is an abomination unto God and to anybody that God's
given any sense. Abomination. There's given unto
this beast a mouth. I thought about the press. Press
glorifies the beast, and they give him a platform from which
to spread his corruption to everybody. That's just one, and preachers
declaring it, again, I think we're getting to that part. But
this world, boy, they love to talk about it, don't they? They
love to spout off about all of their blasphemies and horrible
spiritual deformity and abomination. proudly shouting out things that
nobody even dared talk about even 10 years ago, much less
20. Things that are utterly contrary
to Christ and his gospel. I'll tell you this, and most
of y'all have known me for a good while, you know I'm not a squeamish
person. I'm not easily shocked. People see something and say,
oh, that offended me. Give me a break. Are you kidding
me? You're just showing off. You're just, what do they call
it, virtue signaling? I hate words like that, but anyway,
that's what they're doing. They're not offended by it. Come
on, nobody can be offended by that. And I'm not offended by
hardly anything. When somebody says something
false or demeaning about the master, how could you not be
offended by that? But that's rare, just coming right out and
saying it. It happens. I'm not easily disgusted. But I'll tell you this, I don't
know how long 42 months is, but I pray to God with all of my
heart that it's almost up. I pray it's almost over. And
I know it could get a lot worse. I know it's almost certainly
will. I know for one thing, it can
get a lot harder for us to insulate ourselves from it. That's likely
gonna happen soon, I would say. Because we are insulated from
it to a great degree here. And that could get a lot harder,
but I don't wanna live that. I don't wanna experience that.
I pray that it's 41 and nine tenths months or up right now,
whatever that is. I really do, I pray that with
all my heart. He makes war with the saints
and overcomes them for a set time now. For a while, we're
gonna be helpless to do anything about it. We're not getting a whole lot
of wins here lately, are we? As the people of God. We're not
getting many wins in this world, doesn't look like it. And notice that there's one distinction
given in verse eight, One distinction, they that dwell upon the earth
shall worship him whose names are not written in
the book of life of the land, slain from the foundation of
the world. Will we be overcome in the sense that we'll end up
worshiping the dragon? Will we overcome in that sense
that we'll be destroyed with him, that we'll worship the dragon
and the beast and be lost forever? No way. Why not? Because God
wrote our names in a book before we were ever born. That's the
only reason given here. It's a pretty good reason, isn't
it? You know why he wrote those names down? Those are the ones
he loves. It's the love of God that saves
us. It's God's love, God's electing
love and grace. Or all would mean all. And all of this terrible description
of the beast and the dragon and what they're gonna do, it's all
according to God's purpose. Look at verse 10. He that leadeth
into captivity shall go into captivity. Doesn't look much
like that now, but they shall. He that killeth with the sword
must be killed with the sword. Here is the patience and the
faith of the saints. In other words, it's what we're
waiting for. It's what we believe that God's gonna, he's gonna
defend us. He's gonna vindicate us. Our enemies are going to get
what's coming to them. That's what we're steadfastly waiting
for by God's grace. And this is what we believe regarding
all of this. We know who wins. We don't have
any doubt about that. All those who oppose our Lord
and our God will get exactly what they deserve. And we long
for that. We wait for it. We desire it. We pray for it
because by God's grace, we love him. And it tears at our hearts that
he's blasphemed in this world. David asks, how long, oh Lord?
How long? Tears at our hearts that he's
lied about and despised. And this is our part. We wait
on God. Our part is nothing, just like
it always has been. We're just waiting on God. We're
waiting on him to do what he's promised he'll do. This is our
patience and our faith. Stand still and see the salvation
of the Lord. That was our part at the Red
Sea and it's our part tonight. We're just going, what are we
going to do about it? We're going to wait on him. We're going to
stand still and watch him save us. That's what we've always done.
And that's what we'll continue to do. We trust it. We know that
all he has to do is say the word and it's all over. And then life
begins, true life begins. Well, let's look at the second
beast while we still have some time. This may be the same beast,
just in a different, from a different perspective.
It may be because of the way the wording is here, but it may,
be that the first beast represents secular antichrist, non-religious,
evil and blasphemy, and there's plenty of that in this whole
world. And that this second one represents religious antichrist. But when it boils right down
to it, it's the same thing, isn't it? It's the same thing. But
called two different beasts here because of the the distinctions
that we can see in them. So look at verse 11. And I beheld
another beast coming up out of the earth and he had two horns
like a lamb. And he spake as a dragon. He's
not described in the, as some hideous creature with seven heads
and 10 horns, 10 crowns or whatever it was, I
forgot what it was. What was the 10? Anyway, this
is a lamb. You see why I'm thinking this
is false religion? This Satan appears, let me read
you a verse of scripture, Matthew 7, 15. Beware of false prophets
which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are
ravening wolves. That seems to be the picture
here. He has two horns like a lamb, and he speak as a dragon. Now
that sounds scary, but we need to look into that a little bit.
He speaks like a dragon, but he looks harmless. False religion
presents itself as benevolent and charitable and loving. But the first beast described
what's on the inside. This one is describing what's
on the outside. And the word dragon here, it
means great serpent. And it's the same word used to
describe Satan in other places. So they speak like Satan. They
talk like the devil and you know how he talks. It's not scary. He deliberately speaks in words
of religion, speaks of God and heaven and hell. and uses all
the right words that people want to hear. Satan approached Adam as though
he had Adam's best interests at heart. That's how the dragon
speaks. He was subtle and crafty in his
speech. And that's how the false prophets
are too. Now the two beasts though, they have exactly the same agenda.
Look at verse 12. And he exerciseth all the power
of the first beast before him, and causeth the earth and them
that dwell therein to worship the first beast whose deadly
wound was healed. And he doeth great wonders so
that he maketh fire come down from heaven on the earth in the
sight of men, and deceiveth them that dwell on the earth by the
means of those miracles which he had power to do in the sight
of the beast. saying to them that dwell on
the earth that they should make an image to the beast which had
the wound by a sword and did live. A false religion is all
about the outward, as we see here. It's an outward spectacle.
Fire's coming down from heaven and things like that. It's not
literal. None of this is literal. There's
no literal beast. It's representing spiritual wickedness
and evil nature. And groups of people are represented
all through the book of Revelation. And again, chapter 17 will help
you with that. I recommend reading that later.
It talks about different things and what they represent. And
it helps a little bit on this, but it would be quite a bit of
reading for us to do tonight. But he deceiveth them that dwell
on the earth by means of those miracles. But notice that the
miracles are a deception and deceiveth them that dwell on
the earth. It's not what you see is what you get. It's a deception. They're not doing real miracles.
They pretend to do miracles. miraculous thing, they claim
it's a miracle, you know, if they reach some monetary goal,
it's a miracle of God, or we got enough to save the world,
or whatever. It's not a miracle. It's Satan
giving you what you want, and deceiving you about it. They're all about the outward
spectacle, and the miracles are a deception, it's all smoke and
mirrors. They've got people duped into
thinking that they're doing miraculous things. And that's the key, that
they're doing miraculous things. Flesh has no patience for nor
interest in the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. They want
numbers and displays of wealth. Everything's gotta be gold-plated,
you know, and stained glass and towering architecture. That's
what impresses the world's religion. Healing on their own terms. If
I just believe enough, you know, things will go my way. That's
humanism, that's not worshiping. That's worshiping yourself. Salvation by their own free will
and their own works. They love it when false religion
tells them that it's up to them to be healthy and wealthy and
powerful and overcome Satan and overcome all their problems and
get out of debt and all that. Everything that they want to
hear. The making fire come down from heaven. That signifies that
the power of heaven is in your hands. God sent fire down from
heaven for Elijah, one of his people, to show that he's God,
but this is talking about them. You notice the wording there? So that he maketh fire to come
down from heaven. That's what's being pictured
here, that man has the power to make God do things and not
the other way around. If we do this, God's got to do
that. We dictate to him. We cause heaven to do what's
done. You can call down the fire. You
know, you can do a rain dance and make it rain. That's the
same thing. Pagan, humanistic, false religion is all it is. You can dance all you want to.
God's got to send the rain. He does it when he wants to,
where he wants to. But you know, false religion,
we're not waiting on God. We're gonna make decisions and
we're gonna get people saved. We're not gonna wait on God.
It's all up to us. That's the message of that passage
right there. And then verse 15, and he had
power to give life under the image of the beast, that the
image of the beast should both speak and cause that as many
as would not worship the image of the beast should be killed.
Of course, not literally killed, it's dead to them. Of course,
over the ages now, people have literally been killed that would
not worship. They tried to kill Shadrach,
Meshach, and Abednego, but that didn't work out. They were able
to kill many, false religion, killed Stephen. We know of some
that have been killed, and that may well happen again. Maybe
that is included here. It may well happen to you, I
don't know if it will or not. He calls us all, verse 16, both
small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark
in their right hand or in their foreheads, and that no man might
buy or sell, save he that had the mark or the name of the beast
or the number, the number of his name. Now, in a whole book,
the book of Revelation and a whole book full of figurative language,
representative language, physical images, some fairly bizarre physical
images that represent spiritual truth, false religion decides
to pick out parts here and there and make them literal. And this
is one of them. You're gonna have to literally
have a tattoo either on your head or in your palm in order
to do business and buy something from Walmart. That's not what
this is. This is happening right now.
You've got no, if you try to go in somewhere or talk to somebody
anywhere about the true God of the Bible, the sovereign Christ
that saves whom he will and damns whom he will, And how far are
you going to get? You're not going to get to do
business with him. You're not going to get, you're not going
to be in on their little world. You're going to be booted out.
And that's what this is talking about. You're not welcome. But they pick out these parts,
like I said a while ago, because they can make scary movies about
that. People will buy them or watch them and they can make
money. That's why they do that. This is not a literal mark. It's
not a literal number. It signifies what distinguishes
false religion from the true gospel of Christ. We are sealed
in our foreheads. I believe that's in chapter seven
of Revelation. God has sealed us in our foreheads. That's different from a mark
being put on there. And it ain't got nothing to do
with the hand. hands not involved in it. God seals, He's given
us a knowledge of Himself and we can't lose it. We're sealed
in the forehead. What God has blessed us with
to know Him is everlasting life and we can't lose that, we're
sealed. That's a whole lot different
than having a mark, a signifying, distinguishing mark on you. What
is it that distinguishes false religion from the truth? Listen
to it now, this is very clear once you see it. Their foreheads
or their hands are marked. And this is a signifying mark
that makes them, you can tell just like that by these marks
that they're worshipers of the beast and the dragon. Theirs is a religion of knowledge
and works. And that's how you know. That's
how you know. Paul said, knowledge puffeth
up. Knowledge without the love of
Christ will just puff you up. You'll be writing a book called,
I Know More Than You, and following it up with a sequel called, I
Still Know More Than You. If God doesn't have mercy on
your soul, Knowledge will puff you up. Knowledge even of the
scriptures will puff you up. Why did the Lord say to the religious
Jews, search the scriptures for in them you think you have eternal
life? Read your Bible. They had read
it probably hundreds of times and had most of it memorized.
And he said, you need to read it again. because they are they
which testify me and you will not come to me that you might
have life. Why did Paul describe those who
have a form of godliness but deny the power thereof this way
in 2 Timothy 3, 7, ever learning and never able to come to a knowledge
of the truth. Ever learning, ever learning.
We've got it all figured out now. This is one of two things that
distinguish false religion from the true worship of God. False religion is all about how
much you know. True worship is about who you
know. And more importantly, who knows
you. The other mark is in the hand.
And it's the same mark but it's in either of these two places.
The hand signifies work throughout the scripture. We do evil with
both hands earnestly, the scripture said. The hand signifies work,
what you do. And notice that the mark is in
either place. Those who boast their knowledge
of scripture, they usually know scripture. It's not, they're
not bluffing. A lot of times they might be,
but not always. They know that it's not of works.
Everybody really knows that. You can't miss that in the word
of God. You can't really miss that. But they've still missed Christ.
They've missed Christ. They trust their doctrinal correctness. They would never take the mark
in their hand. They wouldn't do that. They know
it's not of works. They talk about grace all the time. But
they take it right here. They're marked right here. They want everybody to know how
much they know. It's not hidden. Look at my head. Look how much
I know. But they wouldn't take the mark
in their hand, but it's still the same mark. In our verse 17 there, it said,
the number, the number. We'll talk about that in a minute.
Others do take the mark in their hand. They trust their works. That's most everybody right there.
They don't know that much. And many of them still boast
about what they know, even though they don't know anything. And
here's what they do know, if they're good just outweighs their
bad, they'll get to heaven when they die. If they make that all important
decision, you know, it's up to, God's done all they can do now,
it's up to me, it's up to me. That's the mark in the hand.
And they're proud of it. They wear it willingly. They talk about what they do.
They attribute what they do, they attribute their salvation
to it openly. Trust in their works, right in
the very face of the Lord, where he said, many
will say unto me in that day, Lord, Lord, look what we've done
for you. And he will say, depart from me, I never knew you, you
workers of iniquity. The religion of this world is
my good outweighs my bad. I mean, this is the mantra of
those who've never once ever done anything good. And we'll
never know that till it's too late. The religion of this world is
I'm a sinner, but I've done something about it. I made a decision. I walked the aisle. I said that
prayer, you know, that made the Lord save me. I'm living the
Christian life. In God's name, I've done many
wonderful works. And what is the actual mark? It doesn't matter if you trust
it in your knowledge or your works, doesn't make much difference,
it's still the same mark. And it's still all about you.
That's the number, it's you. Same Mark, verse 18, here is
wisdom. Let him that hath understanding
count the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man,
and his number is 600, three score, and six. Man was created on the sixth
day, seven is the number of perfection, and six is short of seven. all have sinned and come short
of the glory of God. But we don't need to figure this
number out from other scripture. We're told right there in this
verse, it's the number of man. Best I can tell the A isn't there
in the original. Of a man is one word in the original. Maybe it is there, maybe something
about the grammar dictates that, but I'll tell you this, it's
the number of man. It doesn't matter which man it
is, it's all of us. It's all of us by nature. Three
sixes, since there's three sixes, that may signify counterparts
to all three of the persons of the Godhead in us. And certainly man's false religion
usurps all offices of God. in all of his persons. God the
Father elected a people from the foundation of the world.
He loved them and chose them. Man's version of that is that
he looked down into the future to see what you would do, and
if you believed on his son, he chose you, he elected you. So
in other words, the eternal God was waiting on a finite worm
to do something in order to proclaim his eternal decrees. Christ redeemed us from the curse
of the law. And man's version of that is
we make Christ's offering effectual by our obedience. He made it
possible for us to be redeemed, but he didn't redeem us. We have
to make a decision. The Holy Spirit regenerates or
gives spiritual life and faith in Christ. But man's version
of that is that salvation's up to us. We exercise faith of our
own free will. We choose, not him. The spirit
blows where he pleases. The wind blows where it listeth. And you can hear the sound thereof,
but you can't tell where he's come from or where he'll go.
So it is with everyone that's born of the spirit. They'll deny
that, that doesn't mean that. Till they're blue in the face.
Six is the number of man and it's the number of failure. It's
the number of falling short. That mark they wear in their
heads or in their hand, they're proud of that. Look how much
I know, look at all I've done. All of man's knowledge, even
knowledge of the right things will never bring him to a knowledge
of the truth. God must reveal himself or man
will never know God. And sinners don't like that.
They don't like being at the mercy of God. They don't like
it that it's up to God and not them. They don't think that's
fair. The truth of the matter is it
makes them not God. That's what they don't like about
it the most. It makes God God and not them.
Saving knowledge is completely by grace. God must give us an understanding
that we may know him that is true. Man doesn't like that. Man doesn't
wanna be at the mercy of God, but he is anyway. Whether we like it or not, by
grace, we like it. They take the mark of man in
their heads because they're proud of their knowledge. but it's
the number of failure. And they have no idea. It's the
number of falling short. They'll never know God. Not worshiping a false Christ,
they'll never know God. Others take the number in their
hand, but it's still the same number. Man, man, man. Listen to Romans 11, five. Even
so then at this present time, also there is a remnant according
to the election of grace. Just like in the days of Elijah,
God had reserved himself a few thousand that had not bowed their
knee to Baal. And that's why they had him,
because God reserved them. God kept them. He preserved them. And if by grace, then it is no
more works, otherwise grace is no more grace.
If you add one work of man to grace, it's not grace anymore.
But if it be of works, then it's no more grace, otherwise work
is no more work. You can't mix the two. It's all
of grace, salvation's all of grace. If you wear that mark,
doesn't matter where you wear it, it's the number of man. It's man, man, man. That's the
religion of this world, man. When Satan came, you say, well,
why isn't it Satan, Satan, Satan? When Satan came in the garden
in the beginning, what was it all about? It's about you, Adam.
I'm coming to help you out. I'm coming to give you what you
deserve that God hasn't provided for you. God's withholding from
you. It was all about man from the
start. It still is. But I wanna call your attention
in closing once again to verse eight. What a beautiful verse. All that dwell upon the earth
shall worship him whose names are not written in the book of
life of the lamb slain from the foundation of the world. Those
whom the Lord loved and chose from the foundation of the world
and gave himself for from the foundation of the world. They
don't take the number in their head or in their hand. They know
by God's grace that salvation is not due to our knowledge of
God, but his knowledge of us. I wanna know him, I wanna know
him more. I hope I know him more tonight
than I ever have. But that's not salvation. Salvation
is him knowing me and giving me an understanding. You see,
he uses us reading. He wrote a book, so clearly he
would have us read. But you can read it and read
it, you search the scriptures, you think you have life and how
much you know. But you don't know me, and every
word of this book concerns God's Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. By his grace, we know that salvation's
not of works, lest any man should boast. But by grace are we saved
through faith in Christ Jesus. And we're safe from all deception
and harm because the love of Christ for us and that he gave
himself for us is our eternal refuge and hope. He was slain for me before I
ever seen him, before I ever was. And so we are eternally safe
under the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. And that's what this
is. John didn't write these things
down to scare people, to threaten people with hell. These are words
of comfort. We know what's gonna happen.
We know how it is. And we win because our master
wins. He wins the victory and gives
us the victory. That's comforting. Let's pray.