SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 8/25/2015
10:26 AM
My Worship Time Focus: PT-4 The
Explanation of the Harlot
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Revelation
17:10-14
Message
of the verses: “13 “These have one
purpose, and they give their power and authority to the beast. 14 "These
will wage war against the Lamb, and the Lamb will overcome them, because He is
Lord of lords and King of kings, and those who are with Him are the called and
chosen and faithful."”
I want to mention again that in our
next SD I plan to use a portion of one of John MacArthur’s on this chapter of
Revelation in which he gives a review of what we have been studying so far in
Revelation. It will be brief for what we
have been covering, but helpful to anyone who has not followed the entire study
on Revelation.
I have two quotes to begin this SD from two different
Spiritual Diaries from October 3, and 4 of 2005. “It seems that Antichrist will have ten kings
who will be under him, and these will rule ten parts of Antichrist’s
empire. There has been some thought that
these kings will rule different parts of the old Roman Empire, but others have
divided up the entire world into ten parts with each of these kings ruling one
part. Verse 13 speaks of these ten kings
being completely under the authority of Antichrist. As far as the “one hour” from verse 12, it
seems that this means the 3 ½ years of the tribulation period, or it could mean
for the whole 7 years.”
“The verse is saying that these ten kings or kingdoms
will make war against the Lord Jesus Christ when He returns during this battle
that will take place in Armageddon. This
is recorded in Revelations 19 and at the end of this verse there is a reference
to what I believe is the Saints who have gone to be with the Lord at the
Rapture of the Church, which was described in Revelation 4.”
We have to go back to verse ten to explain a section from
that verse “when he comes he must remain a little while.” We can compare this verse with Rev. 12:12
which speaks of the short time that the devil has on earth after getting kicked
out of heaven: “"For this reason,
rejoice, O heavens and you who dwell in them. Woe to the earth and the sea,
because the devil has come down to you, having great wrath, knowing that he has
only a short time."” Short time or
a little while seems to add up to three and a half years as Rev. 13:5 states “There
was given to him a mouth speaking arrogant words and blasphemies, and authority
to act for forty-two months was given to him.”
Next we read a very mysterious statement “the beast which was and is
not, is himself also an eight and is one of the seven, and he goes to
destruction.” John MacArthur states that
this is an “enigmatic” comment. He then
writes “How can the ‘beast’ (Antichrist) be ‘an eight’ king and also one of the
seven? The answer lies in the phrase ‘the
beast…was and is not.’ Antichrist will
be one of the seven kings before his supposed demise and resurrection and ‘an
eight’ king afterwards during the second phase of his rule. As noted earlier in verse 8, Antichrist will
go to ‘destruction’—eternal damnation in the lake of fire (19:20; 20:10). Unlike the first six empires, his empire will
be destroyed by a direct act of God.”
Next we have to look at the ten horns and we have to
realize that these ten horns that John sees cannot be known to any earlier
generation because they have not yet received a kingdom, and they have not
received a kingdom because they are a part of Antichrist’s reign. The verse
says that they will receive power with him for one hour, as seen in verse
twelve, and I believe that this is speaking of the brief 3 ½ years we spoke of
earlier. Now as far as the ten kings I
mentioned that in my earlier SD from 2005, as some believe it is a part of the renewed
Roman Empire and some believe it is a division of the world into ten kingdoms
headed up by Antichrist. These kings
will have a short lived kingdom, but will be devoted to Antichrist during this
short period.
These kings will have the same agenda as Satan and the
Antichrist and that is to wage war against the Lamb as we have learned from the
sixth bowl judgment “13 And I saw coming
out of the mouth of the dragon and out of the mouth of the beast and out of the
mouth of the false prophet, three unclean spirits like frogs; 14 for they are spirits of demons, performing
signs, which go out to the kings of the whole world, to gather them together
for the war of the great day of God, the Almighty. 16 And they gathered them
together to the place which in Hebrew is called Har-Magedon (Rev. 16:13-14,
16).” We will learn more about this
ill-fated battle when we get to chapter nineteen. Here is the good thing to remember about this
short lived battle as it will be Christ defeating all those opposed to Him at
His second coming, but there will be many with Him when He returns including
what I believe are the raptured saints who went to be with him before the
tribulation begins. John MacArthur
writes of these chosen ones with Him: “With
Christ when He returns will be ‘the called and chosen and faithful’—a reference
that can only apply to believers (cf. 19:14; Matt. 22:14). The terms are rich in their definition of
believers as the eternally elect, ‘chosen’ in the Son before the foundation of
the world (Eph. 1:4); the ‘called,’ summoned in time by the Father to repentance
and faith, the genuine eternal life that endures by the power of the Spirit (Rom.
8:9). The Lord Jesus Christ will
effortlessly crush the greatest armed force ever assembled when He returns with
His elect and the holy angels (Matt. 24:30-31; 2 Thess. 1:7).”
Spiritual meaning
for my life today: The promise that
I will be with Jesus Christ when He returns to planet earth is mindboggling to
me, but it is something that I look forward to and want to do my part to make
sure others will be there too.
My Steps of Faith for Today: Do my best to show others their need for the
Savior.
Answer to yesterday’s Bible
question: “Six” (Genesis 19).
Today’s Bible
question: “James believed that Rahab was
justified by what?”
Answer in our next SD.
8/25/2015 11:17 AM
No comments:
Post a Comment