In Revelation 13, just as a reminder
to keep you focused on where we are in the book of Revelation,
you remember when we began this, we saw that the book of Revelation
is a series of seven visions. And it's the, it's the completion
of the word of God to his people. specifically talking about how
things would develop throughout the last days from the time of
Christ ascending unto glory. As he went up, as it's recorded
in Acts chapter one, he came and he finished the great work
of redemption. the great work of reconciling
his people unto God by establishing a righteousness that answers
the demands of God's law and justice. And he died, he was
buried, he arose from the dead, and then he ascended unto glory.
And from that time, where we see the initiation of the New
Testament church at Pentecost, all the way to his second coming,
that's the last days. And he gives us seven visions
here. that give us what I believe to
be seven different views of the same thing, seven angles. One theologian called it like
looking at it through a different lens or a different camera angle
of this time that we go through. Well, right now we're in the
fourth vision. This is the fourth camera angle. It began back in chapter 12,
it goes all the way through chapter 14, we're in chapter 13. And
in this vision, what he's showing us is his church, the true church,
the elect of God, the redeemed of the Lord. the regenerated,
born again, you know, that's the church, his bride, persecuted
by three entities here. Number one, Satan, the red dragon. Satan persecuting the church.
And we read about that back in Revelation 12. Satan identified,
he's identified as the, he who deceives the whole world. And,
of course, we know what he's talking about there. He's talking
about those who are unbelievers and who remain so throughout
until their death. They're deceived. Now, we all
start out deceived, even God's elect, even God's people. We know that because we have
to be called out of darkness into his marvelous light. That's
what the scripture says. That's how the scripture describes
the new birth, regeneration and conversion. But Satan's deception
prevails over those who never come to see the glory of God
in the face of Jesus Christ. And we read about that in 2 Corinthians
4. If our gospel be hid, it's hid
to them that are lost, in whom the God of this world hath blinded
the minds of them which believe not. Now, one thing we have to
keep in mind as we go through these things is that we see that
this is all under the sovereign providence, purpose, and control
of almighty God. This is not a world out of control.
This is not chaos. All things work together for
good to them that love God who are the called according to his
purpose. And so we know God's on the throne. And Satan does
no more than what God has determined he would do. And what it is,
it's not God being mean, it's not God throwing a temper tantrum,
it's not God out of control, it's God's judgment upon this
sin-cursed, unbelieving, unregenerate world. The second symbol that
was given that speaks of persecuting the church, is the beasts that
come up out of the sea. That began in Revelation 13 and
that speaks of the nations, what it's speaking of is ungodly governments,
ungodly empires. Certainly they would focus on
the Roman Empire in their day when John was writing this, but Don't limit it to the Roman Empire. Don't limit these things to people
like Nero. Of course, Nero, the mad emperor
Nero who persecuted Christians. Of course, he's included in this,
but don't limit it there. Rome was symbolic of all ungodly
empires, all ungodly governments, all ungodly men who are in control
some way politically or economically. They are against Christ. They're
against the gospel. They're against the church. They
want people to believe that they're the savior. Government can save
you. Don't we have that kind of thing
going on today? Even in this country? Who do people want to
look to for their salvation? I'm not talking about eternal
life, but even that. We can save the world. They can't.
All right? So you have ungodly gut. Now
here's the next one. Here's the second beast. Look
at verse 11. He says, And I beheld another
beast coming up out of the earth. And this beast, he had two horns
like a lamb, and he spake as a dragon. Now this second beast,
as the first beast arose out of the sea, this beast arises
out of the earth, And what that represents in some is a more
settled and firm even organized beginning. But what he's talking
about here is false religion. And here's what I'm saying, kind
of going back, you remember back several months ago when we talked
about Isaiah chapter one and it started out in the, you know,
talking about the kings that Isaiah prophesied under and had
a list of those kings. And of course those kings, they
represent government. All right. And every one of them
in some way or other had failed even Uzziah, remember King Uzziah.
And what the point that I believe the Lord is making there is that
look, human government, human empire, human kings cannot save
us from sin. They cannot. Even though they
think they can, they try to, they want people to believe that.
Well here, just like Isaiah, remember he talked about their
worship, how it was an abomination unto God. And here's what he
was saying there, religion can't save you. And that's what this
is saying. Religion, man's religion that
comes out of the earth. Now, now where does man's religion
originate from the earth? Go all the way back to Cain and
Abel. What did Cain bring as his offering? The fruit of the
ground. The fruit of the sin-cursed earth. That's what human religion is.
And that's what this beast is. It's human religion that comes
out of the earth. Human religion is not a revelation
from God that comes from above. Human religion is not salvation
from God that comes from above. Where did Christ come from? He's
the eternal Son of God who came to this world. He condescended
and made himself of no reputation. He had a humanity but without
sin. He's God in human flesh. Great
is the mystery of godliness. God manifest in the flesh. Salvation
is not from the earth. It's not from our power. It's
not from our strength. It's not from our goodness. It's
not even from our will. It's from God. Salvation's of
the Lord. But this human religion, this
beast that comes out of the earth, notice what he says here. This
beast had two horns like a lamb. Now, the first beast, you remember,
had 10 horns. Well, this beast appears a little,
to the natural eye, appears to be a little more subtle, imitating what? The lamb, looking
like a lamb. Now, who is the lamb of God?
That's Christ. He is the Lamb of God. So this
beast is an imitation. Now, imitations can come in different
forms and different degrees. Some can be human religion, that's
just way off the chart. Others can be closer to the truth. And Christ taught his disciples
this in the book of Matthew, chapter 24, when he was talking
about the last days. He said this, he said, some will
come so close that if it were possible, they could deceive
who? The very elect. So don't think that anybody who
says, well, I'm a Christian or anybody who just names the name
of Christ, well, that means they're not of this because this beast
appears like a lamp. Many times it's false religion
that comes in the name of Christ. but denies the doctrine of Christ.
And I'm going to show you some of that in just a minute. But
he's an imitation. That's what he is. It says, he
had two horns like a lamb. That's his appearance. But he
spake as a dragon. Do you see that? His words are
the doctrine of Satan. He appears to be less harmful
than the first beast, you see. Because the first beast really
doesn't come in the name of formal religion. The first beast government,
anti-Christian government, they say, well, we can save you. We're
the answer to your problems and all of that. But they don't put
on a religious facade necessarily. I mean, there's religion combined
in it because we're going to see here in just a moment this
second beast that comes out of the earth, false religion, serves
the first beast. So they're together now. You
can see that. Turn over to Acts chapter 4. We see like a little, what you
might call a microcosm of this at the crucifixion of Christ. And look at verse 26 of Acts
chapter four. Here's a little small picture
of anti-Christian government and anti-Christian religion working
together. And it says in verse 26 of Acts
4, the kings of the earth stood up. There's anti-Christian government. He said, and the rulers, the
rulers I believe that he's talking about is the Sanhedrin, Jewish
court. He says, they were gathered together
against the Lord and against his Christ for of a truth against
thy holy child Jesus whom thou hast anointed, both Herod, now
Herod wasn't a religious man, Pontius Pilate, Pontius Pilate,
you remember what he asked Christ? When Christ appeared before Pontius
Pilate, you remember what he said when Christ talked about
the truth? He said, what is truth? You know
what that is? That's relativism. You want relativism? We can't really know truth. You
see, there's no absolute truth and if you think you can find
it, you're just deceiving yourself. What is truth? Truth for you
might be one thing, truth for me might be another. Now what
does that sound like, folks? Sounds like our day. People even
approach the Bible with relativism. Oh, you read it and you get what
you get out of it, but I get what I get out of it, you see.
Relativism. You see what's happening there?
And he says Pontius Pilate with the Gentiles and the people of
Israel, they were religious. They were gathered together against
Christ, against the gospel, against salvation by the grace of God
based on the righteousness of his dear son. They're against
that. And he says in verse 28, now
look here, well, does that mean God just lost control of this
whole thing? That God is really up there worried about how it's
going to come out? No, look at verse 28. He says, for to do
whatsoever thy hand and thy counsel determined before to be done.
Now God's hand, what is God's hand? That's his power. God's
counsel. In other words, what's happening
is the product of godly wisdom and determination. That's what
that means. Look back at Revelation 13. So here's this beast that comes
out of the air, false religion. Comes in many different forms,
some more deceptive than others. He appears to have a message
of salvation, but it's a lie. Turn to John 8. Look at John chapter 8. I'm telling
you folks, if most people really read the Bible, even on the surface,
and put what their natural thinking is to the test, they would either
be converted by the power of the Holy Spirit and repent of
their dead works and idolatry, or they'd throw this book in
the trash can. That's what I'm telling you. That's how it is. In John 8,
look at verse 44. Who's talking here? The Lord
Jesus Christ. Who's he talking to? Religious
people. The Pharisees. And here's what
he says in verse 44. You're of your father, the devil.
Now how can you say that these men who were sincere and moral,
who read their Bibles, who memorized it, who were considered to be
the spiritual leaders of their day, how can he say they're of
the devil? Were they immoral? Maybe some
of them were, I don't know. Were they insincere? Maybe some
of them were, I don't know. But I know they weren't all immoral
and insincere. Some of them were very moral
and very sincere. Think about Saul of Tarsus. He was a moral, sincere, lost
religionist. Think about Nicodemus in John
chapter three. He was a moral, sincere, lost
religionist. What does he say? He says, verse
44, the lust of your father you will do. Whatever unlawful desire
that Satan inspires, you'll do. Well, what's he talking about?
Well, look at it now. He was a murderer from the beginning.
Now, what's he talking about the beginning there? He's talking
about all the way back in the garden when Satan deceived Eve
and turned Adam away from God. Quoting scripture, remember,
hath God said, hath God said, see? You know, here's what I
say. And how did he murder? Did he
draw a knife and plunge it into the heart of Adam and Eve? No.
He murdered their soul. That's what he did, their spirits.
In that day, you shall surely die. That's what a false gospel
does. It's murder, it's soul murder,
it's what it is. Now this is how serious this
thing is. Oh, well, we all believe the same. That's false religion. And we're
not saying that to be mean or unkind. I mean, I thank God the
day that God intervened in my life to show me the truth. He said, how did he murder from
the beginning? Look at verse 44, and abode not in the truth. He didn't continue in the truth.
Remember those that John spoke of who left the truth? They didn't
continue in the truth. And in first John chapter two,
he said, they were not of us. Had they been of us, they would
have no doubt continued with us. Christ said, if you continue
in my word, you'll be my disciples indeed. He says, because there's
no truth in sight. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh
of his own. What that literally means is
when Satan speaks a lie, you know what he's doing? He's talking,
he's speaking that which is natural to him. When a false preacher
preaches a false gospel, he's only preaching what's natural
to man. The natural man receiveth not
the things of the Spirit of God. It's natural. for fallen spiritually
dead sinners to think that salvation in some way at some stage to
some degree is conditioned on what they do for God. And it
says, for he is a liar and the father of it. So everything,
go back to Revelation 13, everything that this beast that comes out
of the earth speaks is based upon Satan's lie from the beginning.
And I can tell you the title of Satan's message in the beginning.
You know what it is? Anybody know? Thou shalt not
surely die. That's the title of his message.
And you know what? It sounds so good to the natural
man. Now think about it. When we come along and we speak
of those who don't know or are not submitted to the gospel message
of the righteousness of God in Christ, which is the righteousness
of the God man freely imputed to his people. When we tell them
what the Bible tells them that they are, they are in opposition
to God. And if they continue in it, they
shall surely die. That doesn't sound good to them.
That's what I'm going to talk about in the message. Uh, the
title of the message today is our scandalous gospel. That's what it is. That doesn't
sound good. That doesn't scratch the itching ear of the natural
man. Well, there are two ways of exercising power over men's
mind, the natural man. Number one is with warfare and
violence, as in the case, remember, of the Roman Empire. They persecuted
people physically. The second way is with subtlety.
and deception, coming in the name of religion, coming in the
name of glorifying God, coming in the name of love. The gospel does not begin with
the love of God. Does that shock anybody? The
gospel begins with the holy, just, righteous nature of God. and tell sinners who deserve
nothing but God's wrath that if you want to find God's love,
you must look to Christ as the propitiation, the law satisfying,
justice satisfying work of Christ. There is no love from a holy
God apart from Christ. Now that's up. But that's how
false religion comes. Now, I've got several scriptures
there that you can look at elsewhere, but one of the things, what he
says here about this false prophet, what he's going to say next week
about the mark of the beast, we're going to talk about the
mark of the beast next week, Lord willing, it all aligns up
with what Paul wrote in 2 Thessalonians chapter 2 about the last days,
and you can read that and go over there. But look back at
verse 12 now. All right, verse 11, he held another beast coming
up out of the earth. Two horns like a lamb, he spake
as a dragon. He preached Satan's false message.
That's what speaking of the dragon is, or as a dragon. Salvation
by the works, the will of man. Salvation centered around man.
You know, today's false gospel, what is it? It's a man-centered
gospel, isn't it? It's all about you and me. It's
not about the glory of God. And then he says in verse 12,
he exercises all the power of the first beast before him. He
is just as much, even though he may come in the name of Christ,
he's just as much against Christ and against the gospel and against
the church as the first beast. Yeah. He causeth the earth and
them that dwell therein. Now remember in the Bible, when
you talk about the earth dwellers, then that's talking about people
who are so tied to the earth that they will never seek the
Lord. Now, you know, by nature, we're all tied to the world,
aren't we? And we know that if God doesn't intervene in a sovereign,
sovereign power and act, of providence and of spiritual regeneration,
we would still be so tied to this earth we would never seek
the Lord. So we don't have anything to brag about now here. We don't
have anything to boast about. If we're saved, if we believe,
if we have true saving faith, if we're submitted to Christ
as the Lord our righteousness, we don't have a thing to brag
about. I'm not saved because I rose above the mass of humanity
and acted better or decided better. That's not why I'm saved. Or
you either. So we don't have anything to
boast in except the cross, do we? God forbid. All right. But these earth dwellers. He
says this beast, he's going to cause them which dwell therein
to worship the first beast whose deadly wound was healed. Now
I talked about that last week, you know, and some of the old
writers, the beast that had the head wound and and then arose
again. Some say, well, that's Nero,
when he killed himself, and then people thought the Roman Empire
and the emperor worship was dead, and then they found out there
was another succession of evil Roman emperors, so that kind
of rose back up. Some equate it with the Roman
Empire itself, which fell, the fall of the Roman Empire, and
then it kind of arose back up in the Roman Church, Can they
say that? I even read one where what he
thinks it talks about is the defeat and casting out of Satan
at the time of the death of Christ. And you saw after Christ ascended
unto glory, you saw the church just, there was a big wave of
conversions. You know, like in Jerusalem,
3,000 at Pentecost, later on 5,000. And then there was persecution
and the church was dispersed. They were spread out and there
came churches popping up everywhere. The Apostle Paul, the Apostle
to the Gentiles and all of that. So however you want to interpret
that, here's what it is. It's talking about some time
where people thought that opposition to the church was dead, but it
rose back up. And so what he's saying here,
I believe, is this. that people are going to flock
to these false ideas, these false philosophies, false governments,
and false religion, and they're going to worship the first beast.
And what that is, we talk about ungodly governments, but what
it is is that people will look to themselves for salvation.
People will look to their own devices. economically, environmentally,
philosophically, and even religiously to themselves. That's what it
is to worship the first beast. And so the government in cahoots
with false religion. And even though we pride ourselves
in the United States, we'll talk about how, well, we believe in
separation of church and state. We do, and I'm glad of that now.
I mean, a lot of people do. Let's put it this way. Maybe
it's getting worse and worse. But I'm glad that we have a constitution
that allows us to worship without hindrance from the government.
It may not last, folks. I don't know. Only God knows
that. He's on the throne. But here's
the key. What you see here is a combined
union of religion and government that makes people look to themselves
for salvation, for well-being, for righteousness, And it's just
not there. It's just not there. Look at
verse 13. He says, he doeth great wonders
so that he maketh fire come down from heaven on the earth in the
sight of men. What do you think he's talking
about there? What he's talking, well, you remember when the gospel
first began to be preached in the New Testament before the
canon of scripture was brought together. It was accompanied
by miracles. You read about that all through
the New Testament, all through the book of Acts, and it was
giving authority to the preachers of the gospel so that people
would look to the word of God. Now, there's a lot of arguments
about that today, you know, what they call the doctrine of cessation.
Some people say, well, those miracles are not enforced today
and all that. I agree with that, but I'm going
to tell you something. I want you to listen to me here. Anybody
who doesn't agree with that, and says, well, we still perform
miracles today. And you know you've got these
faith healers and they're charlatans. Now that's the truth. But how
do I know they're charlatans? They don't preach the gospel.
That's right. So don't argue with them about
the cessation of miracles. Somebody comes along and says,
well, I know I got healed, blah, blah, blah. Well, that's great.
I mean, God does heal. He can heal by the use of means,
or he can do it without the use of human means. I mean, God is
the great healer. Christ is the great physician.
Of course, that's talking about salvation. But he is the healer. But don't argue with him about
that. What do they preach? Where's their hope? What's their
ground of salvation? That's the issue, because I'm
going to tell you something. If they could go over here to
the graveyard and raise them, everyone up, physically, That's
all right, but it wouldn't mean a thing unless they preach Christ.
They're still a false prophet if they don't preach Christ.
But this beast is going to be able to impress people with their
wonders. Over in 2 Thessalonians 2, he talks about those. He talks
about lying wonders, things that amaze people but promote a lie. There are things that amaze people.
Look at the crowds. Look at the feelings. Look at
the emotions. How many people have told you,
I just felt the Spirit there? The only way you're going to
know that the Spirit is present in your worship service is when
Christ is preached in the glory of His person and the power of
His finished work. And it has nothing to do with
feeling. Feelings come, feelings go, feelings are deceiving. I don't know the rest of that
poem, but it goes something like, my foundation's the word of God.
What God says. If Christ is preached in the
glory of his person and the power of his finished work, the Holy
Spirit is there. And if he's within you, he will
bear witness to the truth of that. Whether you feel good today
or you feel bad. Isn't that great though? Isn't
that? I was listening to a preacher
on Sermon Audio who he said he went to, in town he didn't know
where to go to church and he went to this particular church
and he said there there's all this music, canned music started
playing and people started getting emotional and then this guy jumped
out on the stage and he looked at everybody and he says, how
do you feel today? And the preacher said, I looked
at my wife and I said, what does that have to do with anything? What about the mother who got
up that morning and Had to get five screaming kids ready for
church, get them dressed, and get there in a rush. How do you
think she feels? What do you got for her? I'd say if she's honest, she
don't feel real well. But here's what I've got for
her. I've got salvation in the Lord Jesus Christ, no matter
how you feel. I've got a righteousness to preach
to you that will will enable God to justify the ungodly, no
matter how you feel. You may be feeling great today,
I hope you are, but that doesn't matter. It's not based upon how you feel,
that's a lying wonder. He talks about in 2 Thessalonians
2 the deceivableness of unrighteousness. It's an unrighteousness that's
deceptive. If somebody would walk through
that door there, and I'm not trying to scare you or anything,
but if somebody walked through that door and started shooting up everybody,
I don't think you'd be deceived, would you? You'd duck down below.
I hope some of you might pull out your weapons and go to town. But that wouldn't deceive you,
would it? But now if somebody comes up there, I'll praise the
Lord, hey, hey, hey, you know, let's sing a song. How do you
feel today? But Christ didn't preach. That's
deceptive to a lot of people. and makes people feel good. This is what the Lord warned
us against. The deception of religion, the
deception of feeling, the deception of self-righteousness, which
keeps sinners from hearing and believing Christ as the Lord
our righteousness, His righteousness imputed, His blood, His grace.
And this false prophet is very deceptive, as I said. Well, look
down here. Notice he says in verse 30, he
doeth great wonders so that he maketh fire come down from heaven.
Everybody, oh, I just know that was of God. I wouldn't have had
that experience or seen that vision or felt that way if it
wasn't of God. It had to be of God. How can
you know if it's of God or not? His word is Christ preached. It's not about you, it's about
Him. We worship around Him. You see what I'm saying? And he says, like fire coming
down from heaven on the earth, and notice in the last line there
in verse 13, in the sight of men. There's your key. This is
how it appears to men. And let me hurry, look at verse
14. He says, and deceiveth them that dwell on the earth, those
who are so tied to the earth that they never seek the Lord,
never seek his word, by the means of those miracles which he had
power to do in the sight of the beast. This false prophet, this false
religion, does these miracles in the sight of the first beast,
and he says, saying to them that dwell in the earth that they
should make an image to the beast which had the wound by a sword
and did live. They should worship that first
beast. worship themselves. Now you can get into a lot of
specifics there. Like I said, I've got some other passages
there that you can look to. But here it is. It's man-centered
government, man-centered religion, false religion that is in opposition
to the gospel that we preach. All right.