Revelation 13, verse 1, And I stood upon the sand of
the sea, and saw a beast rise out of the sea, having seven
heads and ten horns, and upon his head the name of blasphemy.
And the beast which I saw was likened to 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 his power and his seat and great
authority. And I saw one of the heads, as
it were, wounded to death, and his deadly wound was healed.
And all the world wondered after the beast. And they worshipped
the dragon, which gave power unto the beast. And they worshipped
the beast, saying, Who is likened to the beast, who is able to
make war with him? And there was given unto him
a mouth speaking great things and blasphemies. And power was
given unto him to continue forty and two months. And he opened
his mouth in blasphemy against God to blaspheme his name, his
tabernacle, and them that dwell in heaven. And it was given to
him to make war with the saints and to overcome them. And power
was given to 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 from the
foundation of the world. If any man have an ear, let him
hear. He that leadeth into captivity
shall go away into captivity. He that killeth with the sword
must be killed with the sword. Here is the patience and the
faith of the saints. Now the title of the message
this morning is the war of the beast and the patience of the
saints. The war of the beast and the
patience of the saints. Now, as we have seen in our study
in the previous chapter, our Lord Jesus, who was promised
and prophesied to come, the seed of the woman, The one who should
crush the head of the serpent. We see in the prophecy in the
previous chapter, He came forth. Verse 5 of chapter 12 says, And
she brought forth a man-child who was to rule the nations with
a rod of iron. And her child was caught up to
God and to His throne. Our Lord Jesus Christ came into
this world for one purpose, to destroy the works of the devil,
to save his people from their sins. He came And this was accomplished
when Jesus Christ was crucified, when He was made sin for us who
knew no sin, that we should be made the righteousness of God
in Him by His one victory, by His one work of redemption. He has forever cast out the enemy
of our souls, forever crushed the head of Satan and removed
our sin. God raised him from the dead
caught him up as this prophecy said he was caught up by God
into heaven because of his success and victory and if you see in
verse 7 of Chapter 12 you see this war he says and there was
in heaven Michael and his angels now Michael by depth by interpretation
means one with God Who else is one with God but Christ? This
is speaking in a prophetic language. It is Christ and his angels that
fought against the dragon, and the dragon against his angels,
and prevailed not. Neither was their place found
anymore in heaven. And the great dragon was cast
out, that old serpent called the devil and Satan, which deceived
the whole world. He was cast out into the earth,
and his angels were cast out. And what is the result of this
victory? Look at verse 10. And I heard
what the loud voice saying in heaven, Is salvation come? Now is come salvation and strength
and the kingdom of our God and the power of his Christ, for
the accuser of the brethren is cast down. Cast down. Now is come salvation. Man by nature cannot save himself. Man by nature is evil. vile,
wicked, and defiled. Man by nature is absolutely and
completely, utterly depraved. He cannot by any power of his
own, not by his will or any means of the flesh or religion, obtain
righteousness. Nor by any sacrifice can he ever
obtain redemption. You know, this is vital to the
gospel. Except a man understand this,
he can never know the gospel, except he know his own depravity. I heard it this weekend again.
I heard it before. If a man's wrong on the fall,
he's wrong on it all. There's just no way you can know
anything of salvation if you don't know anything about a man's
need. Though religious men and so-called
Christians seek some unholy mixture of salvation by grace and works,
by will or ceremony, Paul says there's no such gospel. You cannot mix works and grace. It is impossible. Paul says in
Romans 11 it is either of works or it is of grace Because if
it is of works it is no more grace Otherwise grace is no more
grace or work is no more work. You ruin the meaning they don't
mix So Paul said to the Galatian
church, he said, if you be circumcised, Christ shall profit you nothing. If you add one thing to this
salvation, you defile the whole. To add one work to the work of
Christ, one of your own works, you must understand what you
are saying is that Christ's work is not sufficient. You're saying that Christ's work
needs something you can provide. If you must in some measure contribute
to your salvation, you have no salvation. Why? Because our gospel says
salvation is now come. It is come. Salvation is won. Salvation is accomplished. It's
finished. The work is done. The message
of salvation is this. It is finished, forever complete,
ordered in all things, and sure. His salvation is one of free
grace and mercy towards only one group of sinners, one group
of people. Sinners. Sinners. You see, I've said this
before, only absolute sinners need an absolute Savior. Jesus said, I am come not to
call the righteous, But who? Sinners to repentance. The gospel is always toward sinners
because they're the ones who need saving. A righteous man
doesn't need saving. Only the dead need life. Only
the blind need sight. Only the lame need power and
strength to come to Christ. And this we see only as we have
been quickened by the power of the Holy Spirit. You can only
know this after you've been quickened. You only realize this after the
Spirit of God comes in power. We know this, that when we were
quickened, we recognized this, all the powers of God. All the
powers of God. For Christ is our King, having
accomplished and prepared a place for us in the kingdom of God,
has given us life and faith. And this is our comfort. No man
can pluck us out of his hand. He said, my sheep, I know my
sheep. He chose his sheep. I know my sheep. And you know
what? I'm known of my sheep. You know, I'm saved by not what
I know, but who I know. I know whom I have believed.
I know His work. His work is perfect. His work
needs nothing. It has accomplished my salvation,
and I have believed only by the power and grace of His sovereign
will. I know that. So I know whom I
believed I I know he said I know my sheep and have known of mine
my sheep hear my voice and they follow me I Give unto them eternal
life Now how long is eternal life and tell me when eternal
life begins Did your eternal life begin the
day you believed I Well, then it's not eternal, is it? That's
what we call everlasting life. In Scripture, it's called everlasting
life. Because from now on, yeah, now I have life. Now it's everlasting.
He says, I give them something great. I give them eternal life. And no man shall pluck them out
of My hand. Now, if you've got a weak effeminate
Savior, that gives you no comfort whatsoever. You see, my Savior
is not weak. My Savior came, and He, as Michael
came, and He destroyed the works of the devil with one work. The work on the cross. With that
one work, He destroyed everything Satan had built. Jesus said,
now is the prince of this world cast out. So that he is never
able to accuse us again before God. You got that? God says,
get out! And he is never able to accuse
you before God. seeing our high priest is an
eternal high priest, has entered into the veil with his own blood,
and he ever liveth to make intercession for us, there is no more accusations
to be made. The scripture says, there is
therefore now no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus.
He says later in that same chapter, it is God that justifies. Who
is it he that condemneth? Who is he that accuses you? It's
God that justified, yea rather it is Christ that died and is
risen again. Ever living to make intercession.
Who is going to accuse you? No one. See a picture of this. Go over
to Zachariah. Chapter 3. Zechariah chapter 3 look at verse
1 here. You see this man Joshua. He's
a high priest. He's a believer in Christ This
man is set up at the highest office that God has the office
that is to picture his son and there he is He showed me Joshua
the high priest standing before the angel of the Lord which is
Christ and Satan standing at his right hand to resist him And the Lord said unto Satan,
The Lord rebuke thee, O Satan. Even the Lord that hath chosen
Jerusalem rebuke thee. Is this not a bran plucked from
the fire? Now Joshua was clothed with filthy
garments and stood before the angel. And he answered and spake
unto him that stood before him, saying, Take away the filthy
garments from him. And unto him he said, Behold, I have caused thine iniquity
to pass from thee, and I will clothe thee with a change of
raiment." Now there's this man, Joshua.
He is God's chosen man, standing before the presence of God, and
he is clothed, not in the white robes of the priesthood as he
should have. but he is clothed with a filthy
garment before God. And there stands at his right
hand to accuse him, Satan. It is as though the words were
about to roll off of his lips. Look at him! Look at him! He's
dressed in the wrong... He's filthy! He doesn't deserve
to be here. That word was about to roll off
of Satan's tongue. Do you know in that text we don't
have any word at all from Satan? Before the word came off his
tongue, he said, shut up. The Lord rebuked thee. Why? Because I have caused his sin
to pass from him. Because I have made him a robe
of righteousness. Then he tells the ministers that
stood by he said now you go tell you go tell Joshua that you take
off that filthy garment you put on this one You put on this one
Our Lord Jesus Christ having obtained righteousness and having
paid our debt Commands his ministers to do this to comfort his people
to cause you to rejoice believer and For often, I know, we stand exposed
of our sin. We are often condemned by our own conscience
because of our sluggishness, because of our unbelief. And
the enemy of our souls seems ready to accuse us. Surely he
does to us Doesn't he accuse you often in your mind and conscience He does to our hearts and minds
and we being this is because he that was Conquered has been
cast down to the earth. Look at that in verse 11 of the
previous chapter I'm sorry verse 12 and he says therefore rejoice
you heavens and you that dwell in them But woe to the inhabitants
of the earth and the sea for the devil has come down unto
you Having great wrath because he knoweth that his time is short You see Satan though he cannot
accuse us before God he being cast down to the earth can and
does accuse our conscience and and our minds. Yet before God, He is not able
to speak a word. Before God, He cannot speak a
word of accusation to us. And today, Christ sends forth
His ministers, His preachers to declare this to you. That things are not as they appear. This is what we must remind you
of daily. Things are not as they appear
to be. John says, It doth not yet appear
what we shall be. You won't look in the mirror
and you won't find any difference that you were before you were
saved. You're going to find that old
nature staring you right back in the face. It doth not yet
appear what we shall be, but when He shall appear, We'll see
things exactly how he sees them, how they really are. Our Lord says to you, I have
taken away your filthy garments. I have caused your iniquity to
pass from you. I have clothed you with a perfect
and spotless righteousness. And though we rejoice in this
gospel of victory of Christ, we also see that Satan, though
cast from heaven, is cast to the earth. He's cast to the earth. And friends, God is not willing
that you should be ignorant to his persecution. of the church. He says this in verse 13, he
said, when the dragon saw that he was cast to the earth, he
persecuted the woman. The woman is the church. You
see, the reason of his being cast down is to persecute the
church. God doesn't want you ignorant
of this. He wants you to understand that this is part of his purpose,
his plan. He's cast down to persecute you. But even though his wrath is
against you, God never leaves you without comfort. Look what
happens to the woman who's persecuted, the church. Verse 14. And to the woman were given two
wings of great eagle, that she might fly into the wilderness,
into her place, where she is nourished for a time, times,
and half a time, and from the face of the serpent. And notice
in verse 15, the serpent doesn't quit. He casts out of his mouth
a flood after the woman. He might cause her to be carried
away by the flood and notice this verse 16 and the earth helped
the woman and The earth opened up her mouth and swallowed up
the flood and the dragon cast out of his mouth Our comfort is this believer
God always delivers you God always delivers you He will either deliver His people
by miraculous means, or by spiritual means, or by providential means,
but He will deliver us from our foes. He will deliver us. Therefore, believer, see the
great care and love of Christ our Savior. See how He rebukes
Satan's accusations and dries up the floods of his persecutions. Always. Always. I like this song. It says, sometimes
He calms a storm. Other times he calms his child.
Isn't that so? He can settle any sea with a
whisper, peace be still. That doesn't mean he will. Other times he holds us close
and lets the winds and waves roll wild. Sometimes he calms
a storm. Other times he calms his child.
Either way, we're delivered. We're delivered. He always delivers
His people. Rejoice, believer, for God always
delivers His saints. And see His great victory, His
great victory for all of His elect, that we shall forever
be saved. And as witness of this, He allows
those angry powers of hell to assault us. Why? So that we might
see His love and care. Isn't that always the end result
of our trials? We always are made to see His
loving care. We're made to see of His great
power and wisdom. How many times has things happened
and you said, well, I wouldn't have done it that way. And then
when it works out, you say, wow, wow. That's exactly how it should
have worked. That's exactly how it should
have been done. God does this to display this. He feeds us
day in and day out by His grace. He delivers us. He keeps us safe. You remember that illustration
in Pilgrim's Progress, The Interpreter's House, where he walks in and
there's a fire against the wall. And there's one there trying
to pour the water onto the fire with all of his might, with all
of his strength. He hurls the water constantly
on the fire, but the fire never goes out. It only grows hotter
and higher. And he said, what does this mean?
And he takes him to the other side of the wall, and you see
another man with a vial of oil in his hand, and he is constantly
throwing oil onto the fire. Satan is the one trying to put
it out. Christ is the one dousing the oil of grace on the fire.
And so when the water hits the oil, what happens? It only grows
hotter and higher. This means that even though Satan
has come to us upon the earth We have promise of this I will
deliver you always Always I am with you always I Don't feel
he's with me that doesn't have anything to do with it I am with
you always, even to the end of the world, I am with you. And now in chapter 13, we are
made to see the agents the instruments or the tools of the dragon that
he uses in order to persecute his church. Now here in this
chapter, we are made to see two distinct beasts. The first beast,
very monstrous, very monstrous in his appearance. While the
second beast in verse 11 and to the end is seemingly harmless. You see that first beast he comes
out. He's like a leopard. He's got seven heads and ten
horns and he comes out of the sea and he's open blasphemy speaking
horrible things against God. But there's another beast that
comes out of the land. In verse 11, and he's like a
lamb. He's not like a wild beast. He's
not like he's he's passive. He's very gentle. But notice,
he speaks as a dragon. His mouth, he speaks as Satan,
but his demeanor is altogether different. This first beast is
the hand of Satan, doing his malicious works, his works of
malice and wickedness, speaking open blasphemy, while the second
beast is the mind of Satan, working deception. working by deception
in disguise. The first arises out of the sea,
his body slowly appearing before John. And what does John see
of this first beast? He sees the horns coming out
first and having the crowns. His head appears with names of
blasphemy on them. His body is as the appearance
of a leopard, swift and powerful to pounce his prey. His feet
are as bear's claws, ready to tear its victim. His mouth is
as a lion, roaring to devour its meat. You know,
that's how David describes his enemies. He said they were like
a lion, ready to tear. Ready to tear. Peter writes of Satan, he says
to us, be sober, be vigilant, for your adversary walketh about
as a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. In verses 3 and 4 of our text, this
beast It is then this beast, to this
beast Satan gives power, and he says, and the beast which
I saw, it was like a leopard, and his feet were as the feet
of the bear's mouth, the mouth of a lion, and the dragon gave
him his power and his seat and great authority. They worshiped the dragon and
gave power unto the beast and they worshiped the beast saying
who is like unto the beast Who is able to make war with him?
This beast Satan gives power yet John notices something about
this beast he notices that one of the heads is wounded he says
in verse 3 one of the heads of this dragon was this beast was
wounded and And because of this, and then it was suddenly healed,
and because of this great miracle, the world was astonished and
worshipped the beast. And yet, though indirectly, who
are they worshipping? They worship Satan. They worshipped
him who gave power to the beast. Verse 4, they worshipped the
dragon which gave power to the beast. And now then in verse
6, the beast speaks, his words come out, and what are they?
They are blasphemy. He says he opened his mouth in
blasphemy against God to blaspheme his name and his tabernacle and
them that dwell in heaven. He blasphemes the saints in the
word of God and notice the result of this power and blasphemy in
verse 7 He is given unto him to make war with the saints and
notice to overcome them and Power was given to him in all kindreds
and tongues and nations Believer look around you Have
you looked at the world around you lately? Can you not see it
today that by all outward appearances, who's winning? By appearances,
who's winning? All the world, the scripture
says here, all they that dwell upon the earth, verse 8, shall
worship Him. whose names are not written in
the Book of Life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of
the world. All men will continue in sin
and blasphemy and rebellion. All men will not bow to God,
nor will they come to Christ, except their names be written
in the Lamb's Book of Life. So what does all this mean? What
is this beast? What is this tool or instrument
by which Satan persecutes the church? Well, notice where he
comes from. Verse 1 again. He stood upon
the sand of the sea and I saw the beast rise out of the sea.
What is this? What is this? Well, go to chapter
17. I can find, I found several illustrations
of this in scripture, but I'm just going to go right to the
point. I'm gonna tell and tell what I'm just going to use the
Interpretation that the that the Lord gives in the same book
about this sea go to 17 revelation 17 and look at verse 12 He tells
us what this sea is I'm sorry. I got the wrong text
7 to 15 verse 15 and he saith unto me the waters which thou
sawest Where the horse sitteth are peoples and multitudes and
nations and tongues. So what is the sea out of which
this beast comes? Are nations and peoples. This beast comes from nations
and peoples and tongues. And so the beast that comes out
of the water represents the persecuting power of Satan
that is embodied in the nations and governments of the world.
Every anti-Christian government of this world, where does it
come from? It comes from the people. That's where they rise
up from. They come from people, from the
world. And they rise up to one end,
and that is to persecute the church. In the Old Testament,
the kingdoms were such as Egypt, or Babylon, Assyria, Persia,
Roman. Though they differ in appearance
and law, yet they all had one purpose. They all had one purpose. Persecute the church. That's
it. To persecute the church. They were the arm of Satan to
persecute God's people and to quench His message. And notice
their crowns did not rest upon their head. The crowns, it says
they had ten crowns upon their horns, which means their power
was allocated to them, given to them by Satan. And so long
as the kingdom had power, it was crowned by him. Therefore,
even though the monarchs and rulers have crowns, yet their
authority comes not from them, but rather from their God, Satan,
their king. You remember Herod. In order to destroy Christ, How
many children did he kill? All those children in that region,
two years and under, this man was willing to destroy them to
get to Christ. Can you not see the same spirit
in this generation and this government that we are under? Are they not
willing to destroy children? Not willing to kill children?
What is all that about? Believe me, it is to get to you. It is to persecute you. Don't
go along with it and see how far you get. Stand up against
it and see what happens. Persecute it. Persecute it. Therefore
David said the kings and rulers of this earth have set themselves
against the Lord and against his anointed saying let us break
their bands asunder and cast their cords from us Now I want
you to not misinterpret the use of governments by God, because
God does set up these things for his own glory. Though Satan
may use them, know this, God sets them up for his own glory.
Governments are used of God, are given power by God, as Paul
says. They are ordained of God and
used for good to reward good and peace. and to punish evil. Therefore, believers, though
we may be under such an evil government, we as believers should
be the best of citizens. We should be the best of citizens. We should obey the laws of the
land except and only except when they conflict with the worship
and commands of God. In the early church, as this
vision was being laid out, do you not see that they were under
such a government that would persecute them for nothing? Christians were being burned
for nothing. Matter of fact, one of the main problems under
the Roman government was this. Christians would not and could
not burn incense to the statue of Caesar. Consider how small
and insignificant this appears. You put a little statue of Caesar,
you light a little incense, and you say, Caesar's Lord, and walk
off. You didn't have to mean it. You
didn't have to be sincere about it. You just had to do it. That
was part of the law. They did this because they knew
Christians could not do this. And when they did not do this,
they suffered greatly. So then this beast, this beast that rises out of
the sea are anti-Christian governments. And now then notice there are
seven heads. These seven heads are seven anti-Christian
kingdoms. In Revelation chapter 17, we
see the interpretation of this. I'm not making this. This doesn't
come from me. I'm just going to give it to
you right out of the other prophecy here. Verse 10 of Revelation
17, it says, And there are seven kings, five are fallen, one is,
and the other is not yet come. And when he cometh, he must continueth
a short space. So these seven heads are seven
kings. And now one of these heads is
wounded. It means one of these kingdoms have ceased its persecution. It appears to be dead, but it
is revived. It is revived again to its former
role of persecution. And this revival of this kingdom
causes the world to wonder and to follow after it. Now, this
is not just one time. I believe this is several times
that this happens over the course of history. We can even see it
in the past century with the fall of Germany. Think about
that. That nation was on the brink
of ruin. It seemed that it was a very persecuting nation. Cause
the world war one so you see the death and destruction that
it that it caused and it was on the brink of death And then
all of a sudden here comes a man And the kingdom is risen again,
and oh my goodness that just Patriotism is a very powerful
motive to follow and worship a government, isn't it? And so
it's a tool used to cause men to follow and worship. I'm telling
you people worship our government and There's a difference between
being a good citizen and then worshipping your government thinking
it could heal all your sorrows and woes and troubles. And yet
men do! If you follow after natural law
of your own heart, it's natural for men to do this. But notice how long this is going
to endure. In verse 5 it says it was given
to him to speak great things of blasphemy and power was given
to him to continue forty and two months. What did I tell you
forty and two months was? 1260 days it is all the day days
of the dispensation of grace This is going to happen continue
this beast Rising up out of the sea his his head being wounded
these kingdoms and nations wars and famines They're all going
to come and they're all for this person's purpose to make war
with you That's it. These kingdoms rise up to make
war with you This is going to continue all the days of grace. But even in these dreadful days,
even in these darkest of times of suffering of the church, though power is given them to
make war, yet God will in every age save His people. This is His promise. Notice this
that those who worship the beast their number is limited It may be many but I tell you
this it's not everyone in that good news You see only those
that worship the beast are those whose names are not written in
the book of life Those who are not the elect of God, those who
are not redeemed of Christ, and those who are not called of the
Spirit of God, they shall worship the beast. They shall bow... They're always looking for something
to worship, aren't they? And many follow after false religion,
which is the next beast, but there are many who follow after
the religion of government. Especially the anti-Christian
government. Look around you. Can you not
see it so? Why do you think there's so many
protests? And believers, look, that's not
for us. We're not here to protest and change things by government.
I do not. I love this country, but I do
not worship this government. This government is not my king.
Christ is my king. But I'll tell you this, there's
many who worship government in the name of God. They think they're
doing it for the name of God, for the glory of God. No. God
commands His church to preach the gospel. Did you ever see
Paul with a picket sign? Have you ever seen any of the
Christians out there picketing the persecution of the church?
It's not our place. Vengeance is mine, saith the
Lord. I will repay. Isn't that what
he's telling us in our vision? Look at this. Look at this closely.
He said, He that hath an ear, let him hear this. He that leadeth
into captivity shall go into captivity. He that killeth with
the sword must be killed with the sword. Here is the patience
and faith of the saints. Vengeance is mine. I will repay,
saith the Lord. What are we to do? Believe on
Jesus Christ and serve Him, even in the midst of the beast. So what if they overcome us?
Do they really overcome us? Those Christians who were burned,
they were overcome. But were they really overcome? No. See, power is given to the
beast so that he might even kill you. He might overcome you. He that leadeth into captivity
shall be brought into captivity. He that kill me with the sword
will die with the sword. God will take care of him. So
what is our business? Patience. Faith. Patience. Faith. You see how practical this is?
It's not mystical. Practical. We see this every day. The beast
is all around us. Don't fear him. He looks vicious
and he openly blasphemes our God. God take care of him. Does that not just give you peace?
Can you not read the news now with such peace? That's what's happening. Look
at that beast rising up out of the sea. What is that to you? God take care of that. Believe
Christ. Pray God bless this to you.