Mary Fairchild
The following is based on the phonetic writing of the expository teaching tapes of Pastor Jim Mooberry.
We are introduced to the biblical person called the Anti-Christ. It is a rather common term today, usually an apocalyptic figure that is the personification of evil. That is only half of the story. The Greek word is Anti-Christus. Christus means Christ and Anti means two things. It can either mean “over against,” in English we get the idea of anti as being opposed to something and he is opposed to Christ, but it also means “in place of.” The anti-Christ is not only the personification of evil and opposed to our Christ, but he is also offered as a substitute. He declares to be Christ, and the world will receive him as such. He has many other titles in the Bible.
He is called the “little horn” in Daniel 7, in “insolent king” in Daniel 8, and in chapter 9 “the prince that shall come.” In the New Testament in 2 Thessalonians, Paul refers to him as “the man of sin,” and “the wicked one.” John is the one who calls him “anti-Christ” in his first letter and in chapter 13 of the book of Revelation he calls him “the beast.”
Many people think that we can’t know anything from prophecy and don’t think we need to study it. That’s not why God gave it to us. Otherwise He wouldn’t have given it to us. There is much to learn about God and His plan in the book of Revelation. This particular passage is a difficult one. The anti-Christ is going to reign just before Christ returns to establish His kingdom. His reign is in the last half of the tribulation period. Actually, he is involved in ruling during the whole seven years but it is the last three and a half that his diabolical nature finally becomes known and he declares himself to be God and he rules as an absolute dictator. Today’s passage gives us a prediction of a future world government that is going to arise from the ashes of the Roman Empire. It’s going to be centered in Europe, but it is going to be worldwide in its scope and its power. This government is going to be ruled by this man called the man of sin, the beast, the anti-Christ. During that time the goal of Satan is to re-establish emperor worship and worship this man and thereby worship Satan himself for he has always desired to be like the Most High, the Possessor of heaven and earth. He has always desired for the creature of the earth to worship him. During this brief period of time he will succeed for a season. We live in a day that is not very far away from these days.
“THE STREETS OF OUR COUNTRY ARE IN TURMOIL. ANTI-GOVERNMENT GROUPS ARE SEEKING TO DESTROY OUR COUNTRY AND THE REPUBLIC IS IN DANGER FROM WITHIN AND WITHOUT. WE NEED STRONGER LAW AND ORDER. WITHOUT LAW AND ORDER OUR NATION CANNOT SURVIVE”
This was stated in 1932 by Adolf Hitler. During that time history shows that a dictatorship always arises when there is a climate of economic, political, and moral breakdown in a country or society. The conditions then are ripe for a strong and authoritarian leader to step forward. HIS LEADERSHIP WILL RESULT IN, INTITIALLY, PEACE AND JUSTICE AND ORDER, BUT NO ON HAS ANDY IDEA ABOUT THE BRUTALITY THAT IS NECESSARY TO ENSURE THAT. Eventually, he will be shown for what he is. This is what happened in Germany in 1930. They were in desperate financial straights after WWI. In fact, inflation had gotten so bad that there were people that were virtually starving everywhere. The communists where stirring up dissent and there where riots in the streets and the universities. The German society was on a verge of collapse, then came forth a man—Adolf Hitler. We was a man that was a great orator. A voice of authority in the midst of the chaos. He used to stand and weep openly as he would recount the past glories of Germany that had been crushed in WWII. He would shout confidently of the future glories of Germany that would come and the response was overwhelming. It was enthusiastic. Records show that even evangelical Christians, the great number of them proclaimed him as a godsend to Germany. His early successes built upon what he had championed as one who would be a savior of Germany and finally we know the story. Hegel said “History teaches us that man learns nothing from history” and someone else has said “If we fail to learn the lessons of history we are condemned to repeat them.” That is exactly what is going to happen and it may not be far off.
Caesar worship in the Roman Empire is going to return again. Full blown Caesar worship was not something that started overnight, but it took years to develop. It began in the eastern part of the kingdom from those nations that were used to the idea of having a ruler that claimed to be God. In fact, it was the Roman subjects of Pergamum who were the first in their ingratiating of making Caesar deity and building a statue to him. It was simply a political ploy; a way for them to try to ingratiate themselves to Caesar. Later Caesars recognized the advantages of accepting the veneration of the masses because it was a unifying principle in this great kingdom of theirs. It also was an indicator of political correctness of all of the subjects. The late first century when the apostle John wrote during the reign of Domitian, the deity of Caesar and Caesar worship was law. Every Roman subject was required once a year to appear before an official priest for incense to Caesar and declare him to be Lord. That event was witnessed by a signed certificate, if you did not have your certificate then you were headed for the coliseum, or for the crosses. For many this was just a necessary annoyance, you just added another God to the pantheon; you did it because it was politically expedient. For Jews and Christians it was entirely different matter as multitudes upon multitudes gave their testimony in their own blood. This is coming back. The vision of the apostle John sees a repeat of history on the horizon.
Chapters 12 and 13 of the book of Revelation introduces us to seven personages which are representative of the main actors in the final drama of world events before Christ returns. We have seen five of them already in chapter 12. The woman symbolized Israel in the last days. The Dragon is the devil. The male child is Christ. The angel Michael symbolizes the holy angels of God in heaven. The rest of the woman’s seed symbolizes the remnant of believers in those last days before Christ returns. There are two more, the beast out of the sea which is the anti-Christ, and the beast from the earth which is the false prophet.
The despot of the dragon is the great dictator called the anti-Christ. The dragon, or Satan, stands on the sea and he calls forth the beast (his man, his kingdom). In the Scriptures, when the sea is referred to in prophetic Scriptures, it is representative of the nations and cosmos. The world system that is against God is called the sea. In chapter 17:15 we are told that the waters that the woman sits on are nations and tongues and tribes and peoples. Isaiah 57:20 says that the wicked is like the sea that is tossed back and forth and there is no rest for them. Isaiah 27:1 is where we find Isaiah declares by the Spirit of God that it is the sea, the cosmos, the nations, that is the residence of the devil. Out of the chaos of the nations, and the cosmos that is against God, comes forth this man and his kingdom, the anti-Christ. There never will and never was a time when the nations were in perfect harmony and there won’t be until Christ comes. The whole mindset of people against God, who are hostile to God, refuse the very harmony and beauty of God and become chaos.
Generally, Satan is called a beast. That is parallel to Daniel 7 where kingdoms were a series of beasts. No matter how cultured a society may be, in His eyes it is bestial because if it is not under His Son, if it is not a kingdom of righteousness and holiness, it is animal-like. He is literally a wild beast, in fact, he is a virtual clone of his master. The dragon has seven heads and ten horns and we are told that is the serpent, Satan.
Although this is a very difficult passage the Holy Spirit has given us the keys to it. We need to look back to Daniel 7 to understand it. Two visions in Daniel have prepared us for this. One was given to Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon in Daniel 2, and the second vision was given to Daniel himself in Daniel 7. These visions are parallel. In Daniel 2 it is a vision of a great statue of different materials and Daniel is given wisdom from God to explain to ebuchadnezzar that this statue represents four earthly kingdoms that are coming, the first one being Babylon and Nebuchadnezzar himself. In Daniel 7, Daniel is given a vision of four beasts, four animals and these are parallel. They also represent these four kingdoms. The vision of the statue in Daniel 2 broke down this way, the head was made of gold and Daniel told Nebuchadnezzar he was the head and his kingdom Babylon. The chest and the arms were silver and Daniel told him that there would be a kingdom that would follow and it is the Medes and the Persians. They were the ones who finally conquered Babylon and ruled for several centuries. Then the belly and the theighs were made of bronze and Daniel told Nebechadnezzar that was the third kingdom that would come and it was Greece under Alexander the Great who then ruled the world for many years. Then there would be a fourth division, the legs of iron and the feet of iron and clay. This would be a fourth kingdom that would come and it would trample down the earth and it was Rome. In Daniel 7 the parallel is that Babylon is the lion, Meda-Persia is the bear, Greece is the leopard, and Rome is a monster—a non-descript beast that Daniel said he had never seen anything like it before and that was Rome.
Daniel 7:7,8: “After this I saw in the night visions, and behold, a fourth beast, terrible and dreadful and exceedingly strong; and it had great iron teeth; it devoured and broke in pieces, and stamped the residue with its feet. It was different from all the beasts that were before it; and it had ten horns. I considered the horns, and behold, there came up among them another horn, a little one, before which three of the first horns were plucked up by the roots; and behold, in this horn were eyes like the eyes of a man, and a mouth speaking great things.”
A fourth beast would come; a fourth dreadful beast. The last thing mentioned about it is that it had ten horns and a little horn that came up in the midst.
Daniel 7:11,12: “I looked then because of the sound of the great words which the horn was speaking. And as I looked, the beast was slain, and its body destroyed and given over to be burned with fire. As for the rest of the beasts, their dominion was taken away, but their lives were prolonged for a season and a time.”
The other kingdoms, although they were destroyed, they continued. This last king and the kingdom is totally destroyed.
Revelation 19, When Christ returns He will seize the beast and those who belong in his kingdom, those who worshiped his image, and these were thrown alive into the lake of fire, which burns with brimstone.
Just as Daniel said, they were given to the burning fire. When Christ returns He is going to destroy this last kingdom, and He is going to remove it from the earth.
Daniel 7:15-17, As for me, Daniel, my spirit within me was anxious and the visions of my head alarmed me. I approached one of those who stood there and asked him the truth concerning all this. So he told me, and made known to me the interpretation of the things. These four great beasts are four kings who shall arise out of the earth.
A king is always associated with a kingdom. Although, for example, Alexander the Great began the Greek kingdom there were kings after him that continued it. It is a “kingdom” that the “king” represents as well.
Daniel 7:19- Then I desired to know the meaning of the fourth beast, which was different from all the rest, exceedingly terrible, with its teeth of iron and claws of bronze; and which devoured and broke in pieces, and stamped the residue with its feet; and concerning the ten horns that were on its head, and the other horn which came up and before which three of them fell, the horn which had eyes and a mouth that spoke great things, and which seemed greater than its fellows. As I looked, this horn made war with the saints, and prevailed over them, until the Ancient of Days came, and judgment was given for the saints of the Most High, and the time came when the saints received the kingdom.
John wants to know exactly what this is all about. It bothers him and causes him to become fearful. The angels explain it in verses 23-26.
Daniel 7:23-26: “Thus he said: ‘As for the fourth beast, there shall be a fourth kingdom on earth which shall be different from all the kingdoms, and it shall devour the whole earth, and trample it down, and break it to pieces. As for the ten horns, out of this kingdom ten kings shall arise after them; he shall be different from the former ones, and shall put down three kings. He shall speak words against the Most High, and shall think to change the times and the law; and they shall be given into his hand for a time, two times, and a half time. But the court shall sit in judgment, and his dominion shall be taken away, to be consumed and destroyed to the end.
What the angel told Daniel was that this fourth kingdom that would come has a couple of aspects to it. We all know that it came in the time of Jesus Christ—it was Rome. Rome virtually crushed the known world at that time especially the kingdom that had to do with Israel. But there never has been a time where there has been ten kings in the Roman Empire at one time contemporaneously. So there is a later development of this kingdom to come and it involves ten kings at first and then one. The emergence of this beast is the re-emergence of this Roman Empire.
Revelation 17:9,10, 12, 13: Here is the mind, which has wisdom. The seven heads are seven mountains on which the woman sits and they are seven kings. Five have fallen, one is, the other is not yet come and when he comes he will remain a little while. The ten horns which you saw are ten kings who have not yet received a kingdom, but they receive authority with the beast for one hour they have one purpose and they give their authority to the beast.
When it says that the heads are seven mountains, even on the coins in the days of Jesus it was recognized that Rome is the city on seven hills. And it says also that there are seven kings. This Roman Empire, at the time of John, had already had five Caesars who had reigned and died. One was reigning at his time and one was yet to come in the future. The five that had reigned were Julius, Augustus, Tiberius, Claudius, and Nero and they had died. The one who was reigning at the time of his writing was Domitian and then he says there is one more coming. He is the final one, the anti-Christ.
The beast is multi-faceted. He represents the anti-Christ as a person, the final Roman kingdom, the revived Roman Empire, and he represents Satan as well in chapter 12:3. They are all part of the evil manifestation of Satan. The development of these things we will not fully see because we will be gone in the rapture. But even today we see the re-alignment of Europe into the Europe community. Some years back they called it the Europe Economic Community. That was the beginning of the alignment it was to be economic, but all the time the leaders that were involved new that it would eventually become political as well. Now the economic has been dropped and it is just the European Community. This is the seedbed from which the revived Roman Empire will come. If we can see the shadows now were are near to the Lord’s coming.
The last part of verse two shows his empowerment. What Jesus Christ would not do, this man does.
Matthew 4:8,9: “The devil took Jesus to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory and he said to him, “All these I will give you if you will fall down and worship me.” But Jesus said to him, “Be gone Satan for it is written that you shall worship the Lord your God and serve Him only.”
Jesus never had any intention of ever yielding to that temptation. But one day there will be one man who will do it and he will yield himself to the devil and the devil will give him his authority and his power and his dominion. All of Satan’s strength and faculties will be invested in this man. This man is going to be like no other man you’ve ever known on the earth in his brilliance and his deception.
The strength of his kingdom is in verses 3 and 4 and it is three-fold. Three-fold strength: first political strength. The main idea here is the revival of the imperialism of the Roman Empire. The world follows after the beast. It submits to him and is lead by him and they are intimidated by his political power. The absolute power of life and death as the Caesars used to have. The power in Hitler’s Third Reich was just a taste of what it is going to be like under this ruler. Some have also said that this is perhaps a false miracle by Satan as well: that this one has been slain and then comes back to life in counterfeiting the resurrection of Christ. Satan can’t give life. Only God can. But this could be a great deception. A lying wonder as Paul calls Satan. He sets up the world by having his man appear to die and then be raised again. Satan is capable of tremendous supernatural miracles. Even in our day we must be careful whenever you hear about a sign or a wonder it doesn’t automatically mean it is from God. You must search the Scriptures and see what they say. Satan perhaps is going to pull off one of the greatest of deceptions on earth and have a counterfeit resurrection.
He has political strength and spiritual strength. Verse 4 says that they worship him and they worship the dragon and they say “who is like the beast?” That is a direct reference to Scriptures in Isaiah. Satan has always wanted to be like the Most High and several declarations of God in Isaiah sound just like this. There God says “who is like Me? Let him proclaim it and declare it.” Isaiah 46:9, “Remember the former things long past for I am God and there is no other. I am God and there is no one like Me.” Then the beast comes along and the world says “who is like the beast?” It’s an obvious play on words that they consider him to be deity. Finally, he has military strength. Who is able to wage war with him? We are told in Daniel 11 that he will command the greatest army the world has ever seen. He will be able to crush the kingdoms of the earth for a season. Daniel 11 says that he honors the God of fortresses.
This Holy Roman Empire will in fact be covering the whole earth and there will be ten districts of earth population. Most of this will become clearer in those days. The season of his kingdom is in verse 5. It says that it is for 42 months. In chapter 12 we were told the period was 1260 days and in another place it was times time and a half time or three and a half years. His absolute power will be from the mid point of the seven year period to the end. He will be on the scenes at the beginning as one among the ten, but in the mid-point of the tribulation something will happen and it will cause him then to be the ruler: the supreme ruler. In the scourge of his kingdom, first its blasphemy in verse 6, he opens his mouth and blasphemies against God to blaspheme his name and his tabernacle, that’s those who dwell in heaven. Jesus was accused of blasphemy in Matthew 26:63 just before his crucifixion because He had declared himself to be the Son of God. The antichrist is going to declare the same thing and the world is going to accept it, but to God it is blasphemy.
2 Thessalonians 2: 3, 4 Paul says, “Let no one deceive you in any way; for that day will not come, unless the rebellion comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of perdition who opposes and exalts himself against every so called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, proclaiming himself to be God.”
John is going to tell us later in the book of Revelation that he sets up an image of himself in the temple in Jerusalem and he declares himself to be God and to be worshipped and emperor worship is returned. It is from that point that he rules supremely. He is going to blaspheme the name of God and the inhabitants of heaven…. he will say they are all vanity and foolishness and that he alone is God and deserves their worship. Then he will persecute the believers. It was given to him to make war with the saints and to overcome them—a time of great persecution and martyrdom. Finally, there will be a deception of wickedness. An authority over every tribe and people and tongue and nation was given to him and all who dwell on the earth will worship him. Everyone who’s name has not been written from the foundation of the world in the book of life in the Lamb who has been slain. There will be a great deception of evil.
2 Thessalonians 2:7, “For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work; only he who now restrains it will do so until he is out of the way. And then the lawless one will be revealed, and the Lord Jesus will slay him with the breath of his mouth and destroy him by his appearing and his coming. The coming of the lawless one by the activity of Satan will be with all power and with pretended signs and wonders and with all his wicked deception for those who are to perish, because they refused to love the truth and so be saved. Therefore God sends upon them a strong delusion, to make them believe what is false, so that all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness.”
The deception in those days will be universal and everyone who does not become a Christian, whose name is not written in the book of life will believe this lie and they will be judged. The only exceptions are those whose names are written in the Lamb’s Book of Life from the foundation of the world. The book of those who have been called by God for salvation, the book of those whose names are written in heaven Jesus said, they are those who come to faith in Christ.
Revelation 20: 12-15 describes a great final judgment, and in that judgment the only ones who are able to stand are those whose name are found written in the Lamb’s Book of Life. How can you know if your name is written in the Lamb’s Book of Life? John 6:39-40, Jesus said, “….and this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up at the last day. For this is the will of my Father—that everyone who sees the Son and believes in him should have eternal life; and I will raise him up at the last day.” Just come to him in faith and believe and receive his
salvation.
WORKS CITED
- Revelation and Church History
- Church Age
- “THE ANTI-CHRIST,” Revelation 13:1-10, #JMREV24; The Faithful Word. *Pastor James Mooberry, “The Faithful Word:Two Decades of Expository Teaching Tapes,