Sermon Central
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Modern Beast
Contributed by Michael Koplitz on Oct 7, 2021 (message contributor)
Summary: What are some modern-day Satan's? Let's start with greed, which multiplies into the wealth of all kinds. Sometimes the beast is inside of us. We must learn to control our inner beast.
Modern Beast
Michael H. Koplitz
In the thirteenth chapter of the book of Revelation, we come to read about two more beasts who will plague the earth. We left chapter 12 with the dragon, who is Satan, being hurled out of heaven and Satan’s vow to attack those who love God and follow the testimony of Jesus Christ.
A new beast comes out of the sea with ten horns, seven heads, and ten crowns on his horns. The description of this beast is a combination of three of the beasts described to us in the book of Daniel, chapter 7:4-6. Satan gives his power to this new beast. The people on the earth start to worship this new beast. Only God deserves our worship, so the beast is helping the people of God to sin. For 42 months, this beast exercises his power over the peoples of the Earth. This is a similar story to the one found in Ezekiel 20:26.
All the people of the earth will worship the beast except those whose names are written in the Book of Life and belong to the Lamb of God belonging to Jesus Christ. However, the names that are written in the Book of Life will not be revealed until the day of judgment. Here I thought that we arrived at our first new idea in the book of the Revelation only to be disappointed to find that the book of life and its opening is told to us in the book of Daniel, the twelfth chapter, first verse.
A second beast comes out of the land. The purpose of this second beast is to cause the people of the earth to worship the first beast. Then we come to the famous number 666. At first, I was considering skipping this symbol, but then I rethought it over and assumed that some of you were just waiting for an answer to this symbol. After all, it is the most famous symbol of Revelation.
Let me tell you why I was thinking about skipping this symbol. The reason is that no one really knows what 666 stands for. There has been a lot of speculation and some pretty good theories over the years however, when you get right down to it, we don’t know. With that said, I will give you the best academically sound theory for the number 666. Numerology was significant to the people of antiquity. They believed that numbers had power. Also, Greek and Hebrew, along with other languages of that day, did not have a separate numbering system. They used the letters of the alphabet to represent numbers.
This part of the theory is an actual fact, while the rest of the chapter is speculative. The first beast, the one from the water, had a fatal wound that was healed. You will have to read the entire chapter to see it. We only read parts of chapter 13 this morning. It is believed that the beast with the fatal wound that was healed may be Emperor Nero. Nero was Emperor when 2/3rds of Rome burned in 66 CE. He blamed the Jews and the Christians for it. All Christians and Jews were expelled from Rome by Nero.
In 68 C.E., Nero was assassinated. The people of the Empire didn’t like him either. There was a widely scattered rumor that Nero had escaped death even though he had a fatal wound and that one day he would return to become Emperor again. You can read about this legend in a book called the “Suetonious Life of Nero.”
The number 666 has fascinated scholars for the past 2000 years. The explanation that is widely accepted today is based on the belief that the tyrant Nero would return. Suppose you take Nero’s name in Greek, which is “Neron Caesar,” and change the Greek letters to their corresponding Hebrew letters. In that case, you have Nero’s name written in Hebrew, then add those letters together, remember that letters represented numbers in ancient Hebrew, then you get 666. Some editions of the Revelation use the number 616. If you take Neron Caesar in Greek and add up the value of the letters, remember in ancient Greek, letters were used as numbers; you get 616.
What are some of the things today that draw us away from God and toward Satan? If you aren’t following and worshiping God, then you are following Satan. So what could draw people to the beast as opposed to the Lamb. At our Sermon Roundtable, we developed a list of things:
1. Money – especially the greed that comes into play with money. If you do anything that is against God’s commandments concerning the acquisition or spending of money, then the beast of money has drawn you away from God.
