The Choice
In Revelation, humanity is divided into two and only two groups: Those who follow the “Lamb wherever he goes,” and those who give their allegiance to the “Beast.” Members of the first group will not experience the “Second Death,” but everyone who takes the Beast’s “mark” and otherwise bows to it will be cast into the “Lake of Fire.” This is no third option or place of neutrality.
What
determines a man’s fate is whether he follows the “Lamb” or gives homage
to the “Beast.” The graphic image provided by Revelation has
profound implications for the disciples of Jesus and their relationship to the State.
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| [Photo by Pablo García Saldaña on Unsplash] |
The group identified as the “Inhabitants of the Earth” is composed of men who take the “Number of the Beast” and venerate its “image.” When they do so, they acknowledge the power behind the Empire as their overlord, knowingly or not, namely, the “Dragon, that Ancient Serpent called Satan.”
The number “666”
is based on the dimensions of Nebuchadnezzar’s great golden image in Daniel
when he commanded all his subjects to “render homage” to it. It measured
sixty cubits by six cubits. Anyone who refused to bow before the image was
cast into a “burning fiery furnace.”
This background
is employed by Revelation but in an ironic fashion. The inhabitants of
end-time Babylon “render homage” to the “Beast” and have his name
or number, six hundred sixty and six, “branded” on their right
hand or forehead. Their names are blotted out of the “Book of Life.” They
will be cast into the “Lake of Fire that is burning with brimstone” on Judgment
Day.
In
contrast, the men who follow the “Lamb wherever he goes” will stand with
him on Mount Zion. They have the name of God “inscribed” on their
foreheads rather than the number of the “Beast,” and rather than the “Lake
of Fire,” they will inherit everlasting life in the city of “New
Jerusalem.”
What
distinguishes the “Inhabitants of the Earth” and the followers of Jesus from
one another is who they choose to serve, the “Beast” or the “Lamb,”
Satan or Jesus. The “Beast” is little more than a puppet of the “Dragon.”
Anyone who renders homage to the “Beast” renders homage and gives
allegiance to the Devil.
NO NEUTRALITY
The “Beast”
is granted authority over “every tribe and
people and tongue and nation,” and in the Revelation, “all”
means exactly that, ALL. Either
you “follow the Lamb wherever he goes” and inherit life, or you render
homage to the “Beast” and face the “Second Death.” It is one or
the other.
So, what does this mean for us today? First and foremost, we must decide to whom and what we give our allegiance - To the beastly systems of the present age or the Kingdom of God and its Sovereign, Jesus Christ.
We may not
yet live under the final incarnation of the “Beast,” but sooner or later,
that imperial system will appear on the world scene. Better to decide now who we
serve before it is too late. In God’s Kingdom, there is no “dual citizenship” or
room for split loyalties. Only one kingdom will be left standing in the end.
The arrival
of this final “Beast” will not be something entirely new. History has witnessed
many attempts by political leaders to dominate regions and peoples. Such regimes
always demand the absolute loyalty of everyone within their domain and more
than one has attempted to establish its rule over the planet.
The “Beast
from the Sea” is the seventh of a long line of empires. By John’s time, the
first five had come and gone, the sixth was in power, which could only be Rome,
and the seventh had not yet come (“Five are fallen, one is, the other is not yet
come; and when he comes, he must continue a little while”).
When
the final iteration of the “Beast” begins to ascend from the “Sea,”
it will not be the Devil’s first attempt to establish the World Empire,
though it will certainly be his last. We must decide now if we will give our
allegiance to the Empire or the Kingdom of God, the tyrannical “Beast”
or the self-sacrificial “Lamb.”
While we are
commanded by Scripture to obey laws and give due respect to governing
authorities, we must never give the allegiance and veneration that belongs
to Jesus alone to anyone or anything else. If we do so, we will find ourselves on the way to taking the “Mark
of the Beast,” and we could easily find ourselves cast into the “Lake of
Fire.”
RELATED POSTS:
- The Beast is Rising! - (To identify the Antichrist, we must understand what the relevant scriptures say about him, his methods, and his agenda)
- Rendering Homage - (The “false prophet” uses every means necessary to coax or coerce men to render homage to the “beast from the sea”)
- The Inhabitants of the Earth - (The inhabitants of the Earth represent the men and women who are omitted from the Book of Life because they submit to the Beast)
