The Revelation 2:12-13 | Episode # 1017

September 2, 2025

Hope Alive: Applying God’s Word to Your Daily Life

The Revelation 2:12-13

I am Chad Harrison, and I am the teaching pastor of Lake Community Church and had been serving as a pastor for 25 years. I'm also a practicing attorney. This podcast is designed to help you study God's word and find God's will for your life. The purpose of studying scripture is that you might know the character of Jesus Christ, and that you might see the world from the Father's perspective. That you gain wisdom that changes your life. I pray in the name of Jesus right now that God would open His word to you and allow you to see Him and to know Him. To know His will, that you might glorify Him and that you might walk in faith and power each day, especially today. In Jesus name.

If you would like to revisit today’s Bible study, please visit our website at https://hopealive.buzzsprout.com/ to download the transcript. 

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Transcript

This is Chad Harrison and you're listening to Hope Applying God's word to your daily life.

Hi, this is Chad Harrison and I am the teaching pastor of Lake Community Church and have been serving as a pastor for 25 years.

I'm also a practicing attorney. This podcast is designed to help you study God's word and find God's will for your life.

I pray in the name of Jesus right now that God would open up.

His word to you and allow you.

To see him and to know him and to know his will, that you might glorify him and that you might walk in faith and power each and every day, especially today in Jesus name.

Because oftentimes,

well, in our modern and then also in just our own church culture,

we don't deal with actual histories. And when I say actual history, I mean, you know, history of some of the places that we're at that we're talking about so that we have some perspective.

And one of the great things about the Bible and one of the great things about dealing with the people of Israel, which is mostly what the Old Testament is about,

is that we have a pretty robust and when I say robust,

great history and an understanding of what took place.

The nations that are mentioned throughout scripture,

if they weren't found before oil was found in the Middle east, almost all the names of the places in scripture and almost all the names of the people in Scripture we found either archeological evidence of, or we know exactly where it's at.

Probably more than half the places are found in Scripture. We actually, I mean, they're still there.

The places actually exist.

And so when we're studying through the Bible, unlike the Book of Mormon or some other books,

even the Quran,

they're not mythical places. They're not places that have no basis in fact.

The Book of Mormon is written, and it mentions almost none of the locations that are mentioned in the Book of Mormon do we have any archeological evidence of.

And they just flat out don't exist. It's science fiction,

okay? But even in scripture, when something seems so fantastic or so wild that we almost assuredly can't be true within the last 100, 150 years, as we have done so many archeological digs in the Middle east as a part of our search for oil and them allowing that to take place,

we have found that even the most mythical of all figures in the Old Testament,

the prophet Daniel, and the reason we call him mythical is because up until about 200 years ago,

most people believe that Daniel had to be written after the things that he Said would happen, would happen. Cause he got it so right.

I mean, he got it so on the money that people said even if he was a prophet, he couldn't have prophesied that straightforward and get it done that easily and that on the money,

you know, for, you know, it. We're, we're in what is modern day Iraq, the areas that we're talking about. And sure enough,

there is a. There's a Hebrew leader,

a Hebrew eunuch named Daniel who is, who is not only high up in the Babylonian power structure, but he, he, he. After they're attacked and taken into captivity by the Persians,

he's found in Persian artifacts. And so his name is in both places.

And some of the stories of his book are alluded to in some of the archeological evidence that we found for Daniel.

So when we talk about Daniel and the lion's den and Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego and all these stories that seem like, wow, could it be. And then his description of the four great empires of,

of the Middle east and Europe are so spot on,

even using their symbology,

meaning the pictures of the animals that they used on the walls of their cities are so on the money that it just becomes obvious that Daniel is.

Daniel's a powerful book because it proves that the prophecy of scriptures is true. Now, I say that because the book, the Bible and the story of God and his dealing with man and especially is dealing with the children of Israel.

And that whole story,

which is kind of a giant play played out in history to explain God's plan through Jesus Christ,

the pictures of how God deals with the Israelites, how he works with them, the laws that he gives them, all those things are pictures of his relationship with his people.

And so when you get to that, when you kind of dig into that, you realize that everything has a reason.

And Abraham comes from a place. He was called from a place. And that place is a important place on the stage of history as far as world religions. And he came from.

Does anybody know where he came from?

He came from Ur of the Chaldeans. That's right, he came from Ur. The Chaldeans, or the area known for being occupied or being lived in by the. What we call the Chaldeans, who are the forerunners of what we would call the Babylonians.

Okay.

And they are the people that live near the. The live near the ruins of a great tower that a man,

the first and great world emperor who had brought lots of nations under his control back thousands of years before. That actually was something that was going on on a regular basis,

a man named Nimrod.

And he's mentioned in scripture,

he was the king of that area.

And he built the tower of what we call the Tower of Babel. Most people think that the Bible says that he built a tower to reach God.

That is not what he did. He built a tower to make his name great so that his name would be as great as God's name. And he was married to a woman.

And that woman became in many ways the pagan goddess or princess of what we would call modern day paganism. And I want you to understand that because it is the religion of the Chaldeans or the Babylonians that spreads throughout most of the world.

Now let me give you some fundamental things, just straight Christian.

I'm not giving you history now, I'm just giving you straight Christian teaching, okay? The gods that you think of in Greece and Rome and the Arabian peninsula, the gods of Egypt, the gods of the Persians, and I'm giving you a broad swath,

the multitude of gods of the Indian continent,

India,

and then all the way over to China.

They all draw their beginning from this worship where Nimrod's wife began to teach the worship of. And you need to understand they're worshiping fallen angels,

okay?

And that's an important understanding because remember when Satan took over,

he's the king of the, he's the prince of the power of the air,

okay?

And the fallen angels that are under him,

we call them an angelic host or which is an angelic army. And those angels that are under him took control of areas of the world. And we see that when Daniel mentions the prince of Rosh,

what he's saying is the fallen angel who rules over what was Rosh or Russia, okay? You'll see that several times in scripture will mention a prince or something. And it's not talking about a, a man, it's talking about something more, a God.

Okay?

And so there were great gods and then there were second tier gods and then there were these,

what we would call today,

if you, if you're, if you're into that kind of stuff, all the, all the videos and, and games and stuff like that, what we call demigods.

Okay?

Now what you think about it, because, because these things have been going on for years and years.

Zeus is, Ra is Osiris. He is the same God,

just in different places, in different cultures by the same name,

Aphrodite. And you can start going through the hierarchy of gods. These are the hierarchy of Satan's fallen angels. They're the ones that were being worshiped. And even some of. Even some of the cults of today,

the Mormon Church has Rabboni on top of their temples. He's a fallen angel,

okay?

He's a fallen angel.

He was the one who gave Joseph Smith those tablets.

And so understanding that you had that, and then you have these demigods, which are half human,

half God,

which takes you all the way back to right before the flood,

when the sons of God saw the daughters of men and that they were beautiful and that they came and had relations with them.

And their offspring are called Nephilim.

The Bible says they were men of old and men of renown, meaning they were powerful men that walked the earth.

But the reason they were is because their father was fallen angels.

Okay?

Now I'm telling you this for a reason,

because that history is all there for you to know.

When you go to India and the Buddhist and the Hindus,

they talk about these different gods that they worship. They're not just idols.

They're not just idols.

They're fallen angels.

Okay?

When we talk about Zeus, we're talking about Satan.

Are you listening to me?

When we talk about these things,

these, these. This is the order that Satan wanted to put in place so that man would do what he always wanted man to do, which is to what?

Worship him?

Now, understanding that is important when you're reading scripture,

but it's also important when you start going, well, how is it that this goddess over here is the same as this goddess over there is the same as that goddess over there?

Well, if you kind of study history, you realize, you know, they got it from this one when they took them into captivity. And this is how that spread all over the world.

And it starts on the plains of Shinar and what is what is called the Chaldeans,

near a city called Baba Baba Babel,

later to be called Babylon.

Okay?

Now, the revelation talks about that, and it calls it Babylon the Great. And what he's calling. What he's speaking of, he's not speaking of a great nation.

He's speaking of a great organization.

Of.

Fallen angels that humanity is worshiped.

All right, now you go. Well, Pastor, why. Why would you go into this?

Because that.

Those. The worship that. That goes on in thousands of years ago has worked its way through time and history to us today.

And many of the.

Many of the practices that we've added to that are not from scripture, oftentimes come from some kind of pagan ritual or religion.

I'm telling you that for reasons. So that you'll have your mind opened up and you'll. You'll figure it out. Such as when the scripture talks about the day of God's res, Jesus resurrection and them worshiping him.

The word used in the Greek is the word for the Passover.

But King James called it what they had called it for a thousand years, which is Easter.

Okay,

well, the problem with Easter is Easter is the transliteration of the word Ishtar, which is that Babylonian goddess.

So when we call. When I call it Resurrection Sunday, I call it Resurrection Sunday for a reason. I'm not Damon. The day my Lord walked out of the tomb after a Babylonian goddess.

It's not the word, it's not the translation.

It is the income inculcation of paganism into Christianity. Now you go, well, why are we talking about that tonight?

Well, because the two churches that we're about to deal with are the churches where that paganism was married to the church,

okay? They're the two churches in the church age where paganism was married to the church. Now you go, well, how did that happen?

I'm giving you some history.

And then we'll go to the. To the word. Well, the way it happened was,

was that there was a Roman general who wanted to be emperor,

and there was another Roman general who had his legions in Rome, and he didn't want that guy to be emperor. He wanted to be emperor.

Well, the Roman general from the outside who was a better leader but had less men,

was worried about losing to the guy who had more men.

And even though he was a better leader and a better general,

he needed an edge.

And about 312 A.D.

he realized that, you know what?

A lot of the men,

in fact more than half the men in my army are from this new religious group called Christians.

And not only that,

most,

at least over half of the people in that other guy's army are Christians.

And so he miraculously saw a symbol in the sky. And in that symbol,

there's actually a Latin phrase for it. And he basically says,

I saw it. And God told me,

by this symbol, you'll win. And it's the symbol of the ichthus. Y' all know what I'm talking about. The ichthys. The, the,

the.

Look it up.

Okay?

It's the igthus.

All right? So what did he do? He had all his soldiers paint the ichthus on their shield.

And so when they went out to battle,

they were.

Most of them were fired up about,

you know, they had Jesus on their shield.

And the ones they were fighting against go,

oh,

I'M not fighting against Jesus. And he won.

And his name was Constantine,

and he became a Roman emperor.

And what he did was he made the Roman Empire Christian.

And so he took all the pagan temples and he emptied them out and he made the priest who used to be pagan priests, Christian priest.

And he took all the holidays that were pagan holidays, and he figured out how he could marry them up to stories in the Bible and he made them Christian holidays.

That's how we get Christmas on December 25th.

Okay,

quite obvious that Jesus was either born in early fall or in late spring by what was going on with the sheep and the shepherds in the field.

Why do we worship it December 25th? Well, that's the winter equinox.

It's a pagan religion holiday.

Now, I'm telling you that for a reason. You say, well, Pastor, you not do Christmas. No, I do Christmas. Okay, all right.

But even Christmas is Christ Mass, which is pagan.

And I'm telling you this for a reason, because Jesus is going to talk about this.

They married paganism,

the world to Christianity.

And if you ask the question,

why do we sprinkle people?

Well, it's real easy.

In order for him to cement his power after they won the battle, he baptized all his soldiers.

Well, you know, if I take them in the river and dunk them, it takes a long time. So what we'll do is we'll get these pagan priests to take some hyssop and put some water in it, and as the army marches by, they'll just sling it on them and sprinkle them and they'll all be baptized.

And that's how you get sprinkling rather than.

Rather than immersion.

And that's why King James made sure he translated it baptismo rather than to immerse,

because if he'd have put to immerse,

they'd have killed him.

And so when you. When you. When you deal with these things,

you need to understand that there's a lot going on historically and spiritually in the background.

So that when you read what's going on in these churches, you get a real insight to it. Does that make sense?

So the first church that we're going to deal with tonight is the church in Pergamos. Okay,

Now,

Pergamos is an interesting town. It's verse 12, and it says to the angel of church, Pergamos. Right.

Pergamos is real interesting because later on after,

after all this took place and there was a great Persian empire,

which, by the way,

allowed Daniel prophecy to come true and allowed the Jewish People to go and rebuild Jerusalem. Well, that same Persian empire had an emperor named Cyrus. And he moved the center of worship of the Babylonian religions,

not the Persians because they were different names, but not the same and yet the same.

Okay?

He took the Babylonian names and he moved them away from him because it was too close.

And he moved them to Asia Minor to a town called Pergamos.

And they built a temple to the great God of the Babylonians.

And after the Romans took over, it was the great God of the Romans,

it was Zeus. And there was a giant statue of Jews of Zeus in Pergamos at the temple there.

Okay,

now I'm giving you that as we read it because he says,

and to the angel of the church of Pergamos, write these things,

says he who has a sharp two edged sword. All right, now that's a reference to Hebrews 4 and you can look that up, it's Hebrews 4:12 where the Bible says that out of his mouth comes a sharp two edged sword and that's able to divide between flesh and bone,

between soul and spirit. What he's talking about is I'm able to divide not only the physical but the spiritual with this two edged sword, okay? And what he's saying is I'm able to determine what is.

Even though it seems like the same thing to you, even though it seems like a soul and a spirit are the same thing,

because they're not physical in nature,

they're not. I can divide between the two.

The spirit is the eternal part that comes from me. The soul is your own emotions and intellect which are different from each other. And that's why when scripture says is able to divide between soul and spirit, he's, what he's telling you is he's giving you a clear indication,

a road map. Me saying, listen, these ain't the same thing.

How many of y' all grew up thinking your soul and your spirit were the same thing?

You did.

Sure you did.

Because,

well,

part of paganism, by the way,

he says,

he says he has a sharp two edged sword, which means he's able to tell you he's able to divide these things and allow you to see how they actually are.

He says, I know your works. Now I want you to notice what he says to Pergamos because he's talking to the church that has existed and is going to exist during this time of transformation in the world and especially in Christianity.

He says, I know your works and where you dwell,

where Satan, where,

where Satan's throne is.

Who's he talking About?

Well, he's talking about a temple in Pergamos.

And who's Satan?

Zeus?

He's telling you the Apostle John is telling you that this pagan religion, Osiris,

Zeus is Satan.

He's telling you that.

He's saying this paganism that's all over the world.

I'm telling you that that person they call Zeus is Lucifer himself.

He says. He says, where Satan's throne is.

Notice and you hold fast to my name and did not deny faith even in the days in which Antipas was my faithful martyr who was killed among you,

where Satan dwells. What he's saying is you're a people of faith. And what do they have faith in? They have faith in the one true God, and they have faith in the word of God.

Okay?

They trust what God has taught them,

not what is being married to Christianity at the time.

He's telling them there was a faithful remnant. There's a faithful group. That even though Constantine says that the whole empire is going to become Christian and what he does is remake Christianity,

even though he's done that,

there's always been a remnant who's held true to not only the faith, but had held true to God's word.

And he's letting them know, I know that about you.

I know that you do that. Now, I want you to hear me today. Because we live in a time where the denial of the authenticity,

meaning people say, well, how do we even know that this is God's word? Well, we know it's God's word. And I've been through that. And I've been through how it's the most historically proven book in human history, okay?

We not only know that it's God's word, we know the actual Hebrew and Greek words that it was written in. You don't read the actual word of God. You read a translation of it in your language.

And we've translated into hundreds and hundreds of languages.

We know what it is. We know exactly what God's Word is. And we know where there might be differences, where this manuscript is slightly different than this manuscript. And let me tell you something.

Those differences make no theological change.

None of them.

None of them. They don't change anything. Theologically,

they're the same.

And so we. We have a faith that is not based off of some myth.

We don't have a faith based off of something that was just handed down to us. We have a faith that. That.

Well, I mean, we have a faith that is grounded in truth,

history,

archeology.

We know what we believe and we know why we believe it.

And throughout history,

so many times we want to say, well, that group's going to hell, and this group's going to hell. But I want you to hear me. Throughout history,

God has held together,

all the time a group that believed in his word and believed in what he said.

And you're one of them, and you're the product of that.

And so it's important that you understand that he says here,

and you hold fast to my name.

And did not deny my faith.

Even in the days in which Antipas. We don't even really know.

There's several myths about Antipas and what happened. And when I say myths, because we don't have really any true archaeological evidence to know what he did, but. But apparently because God says so.

He was a martyr for the faith.

And he was killed there in Pergamos for his faith,

where Satan dwells.

As you go today, I pray that.

The Lord will bless you and keep you. That he'll make his face to shine upon you. And that he will give you hope and peace today in Jesus name.