The Revelation 13:2-4 | Episode # 1091

December 15, 2025

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

The Revelation 13:2-4

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.

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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.

He asked me, did I think the Antichrist was a robot? And I said, you just need to hang on, okay? You just need to hang on. No, the Antichrist is not a robot. He, he, he. He absolutely is not. He's a human being. But there is a. There is somebody that's showing up. And I thought it was in the end of this chapter, next chapter, but I don't think it is. There's somebody going to come on the scene and he, he, he, he, or whatever it is. And when we read it, you're gonna see that. Wow, that seems very interesting. When we read it and you see it, you're gonna say, that is really almost weird how accurate somebody might describe a robot back then, okay? And a lifelike robot. And I say that because, remember, what Satan's doing in chapter 13 is Satan is imitating God, okay? And so he's trying to set himself up his own. His own godhead and his own creation. But remember, Satan has a problem. He is not a creative being, okay? He himself is not creative. And so even. Even the fourth person that is introduced as a part of this unholy godhead is introduced. That one is actually created by the third. By the second beast, which we will deal with next week. And so when. When you think about these, it's important because we're gonna. I'm gonna just kind of give you an overview again. When we think about it, Satan wants to be God, okay? And so if you're going to put together a unholy trinity and a creature that was created in order to worship that deity, which will be the. The robot to come, or the idol is what it's called. But once you realize what it does, you realize that, oh, my goodness, this really could be artificial intelligence or a robot. But, but when God, when. When Satan is trying to imitate God, he starts out with himself. And then the first Beast out of the sea, the one everybody refers to as the Antichrist, the one that Thessalonians calls the man of lawlessness. Okay? The second beast is a. Is. Is supposed to be Jesus or take the place of Jesus. And by the way, I don't even know if I said this last week, but the word Antichrist, especially in the English language in modern times, when I say to you antacid or I use the word anti in front of something or ant in front of something, that usually means against it. Right? Usually means against it. But the word anti in the Greek does not mean against, although it can be connotated against. Okay? And the way, when I say it can be connotated against, the way the connotation can be against it is that any means to be in place of or to replace, okay? So obviously if you get replaced by somebody, they could be the opposite of you or your enemy, right? They could be that. All right? Much like you can have a hero and an anti hero. Okay? They're replacing the hero, but not in the same way as the hero existed. Well, the word Antichrist literally means in place of Christ. So when Jesus says that the Antichrist, the spirit of Antichrist, has already gone in the world and there are many, many Antichrists, what he's saying is there are many who. Who are trying to be in his place, trying to take his place. Okay? And that's why we do study the book of the Revelation. And for sure, we look at 2 Thessalonians, because that has been a problem in Christian history. The book of 2 Thessalonians is literally written to a group of people who thought Jesus had already come back. Okay. And so what happened? Well, there's a church in Thessalonica. Thessalonica. Paul wrote him a letter. In that letter, he talks about the second coming of Christ. Not as a main part of the book, but as a cursory mention. He just mentions it. And then once he mentions Jesus Christ coming back, somebody comes to Thessalonica and tells them that Jesus already come back and they've gotten left behind. Okay? Da na na. Okay. They've gotten left behind. And so Paul writes them a letter. Okay? Which was cool of Paul, because considering he's the one that led him to Christ, it was nice to get a letter from one of the ones who you thought would have gone. That's real comforting to get a letter from somebody if you think they for sure going to heaven. And. And then if somebody says Jesus already come back, you give them a ring. On the phone and they answer, you feel better about it, right? You know, you feel better that you didn't get missed out. So, you know, as letters were so important back during that time period, Paul writing the letter was real important. But during, as a part of the letter, because he's writing the letter, he doesn't want them to continue to be worried. And so he gives them a discourse on the end times from his perspective. Okay? And you go, well, how does Paul know about the end times a whole lot? Well, I think he was actually a follower of Christ. I think he's a rich young ruler, but that's beside the point. Paul says in Corinthians that he knew a man, and he's speaking of this man in the third person as if it's himself who is caught up into the third heaven, okay? And he talks about the wonders that he saw and everything that he understood and got to see. And once he says this, he mentions that there were sent to him. Now, I want you to hear me because this is the only place in the King James version and in the new King James version where this word is translated messenger. It's usually transliterated from the Greek angelos. Okay? All right, so Paul says, I was caught. There was a man caught up in the third heaven. He saw wonders. And God, in order to keep him from being being conceited, to keep pride out of his life that he sent him. And he uses the word angelos, which means, if you would translate it, everywhere else is translated in the Bible. It would be an angel from Satan. But King James and new King James translated messenger, which, by the way, is the proper translation of the word angel. Angel is a transliteration. It's not a translation of the word. Just like baptism is a transliteration of baptismo. Baptism means to immerse. So John the Baptist is actually John the immerser, okay? The archangel Michael is actually the arch messenger. Michael the arch messenger, Gabriel, the arch messenger, Lucifer. Okay? Because angelos means messenger. It says that he was sent a messenger from Satan. And then it says, comma, a thorn in my flesh. Okay? Now why. And listen, why? I have no idea. But in all the years of my growing up and hearing people preach and talk about that, people would say, I wonder what that. What that. I wonder what that thorn was. Was it. Was it that Paul couldn't see? Did he have some kind of physical B injury? You know, the one people love to throw out is maybe he was not sexually oriented properly. You know what I'm talking about? They threw all that Out. And I go, no, let's just read the passage. It says it was sent to me an angelos from Satan, comma, a thorn in my flesh. Okay? So a messenger. So what that means is God allowed an. A fallen angel to attack his flesh to keep him humble. Okay? That's what it means. There's no way to get around it. In fact, if you've got something here that's describing something on the other side of the comma, it's always the something here. Okay? Don't try to come up with something different. Makes sense. All right. Understanding that. That. That is how that work. That's. That. That's what's going on in this passage. That's what's going on in the. In the. In the scripture here. Satan. Satan is trying to create his own Godhead. So. And that's why there is some question about the idea of a Nephilim, the idea that. That the first Antichrist might be literally a son of Satan, okay? Because he is trying to create a Jesus that is an image or a mirror of Jesus in the Godhead. Okay? And so if there's going to be a human being come in the earth in the image of Satan, which. He's. First Antichrist, not a robot, but he is a nephilim. Okay? And how that works, you just. You have to follow me last week as I talk about it. Now, if you want to go back, you can always go back. And I think Kathleen's actually going to put it on the Hope Alive podcast soon. Are you doing. Are you going to do the Revelation? Are you going to do First Corinthians? Okay? She does not know. All right? It's amazing how many times she knows. And she tells me, all right, First Corinthians is complete. You're right, baby. All right. He said. Noted. I know you are, baby. You are always right. All right, now, the beast which I saw, read verse two. Now, the beast which I saw was like a leopard. His feet were like the feet of a bear. And. And his mouth was like the mouth of a lion, by the way. By the way. And it says, and. And the dragon gave him the power, his throne, and his great authority. Okay? By the way, there is a. There is a statue outside of the UN that looks just like this. Just letting you know. Okay. You know. Yeah, there's a statue, just statue, just outside the UN building in the UN on the United nations grounds, which look like this, this beast. Okay, now here's. Here's what's really cool about this. And I saw one of his heads as is. As if it had been mortally wounded and his deadly wound healed. Now, you need to hear this. Notice he is. He is counterfeiting the resurrection, okay? He is counterfeiting the resurrection because he says, I saw one of his heads. Now, notice the language he uses as if it had been mortally wounded, meaning it gives the appearance of being mortally wounded, all right? Meaning the wound in his head looks like it would kill him, but it doesn't. All right? So. So people think he's dead, and then they think he is resurrected. Does that make sense? All right, so they think he's dead, and then he has the appearance of being resurrected. And remember, Antichrist means in place of. So he is presenting this beast as a beast that is in place of Christ, okay? He's to take the place of Jesus. All right? Now, it says here, so they worshiped the dragon who gave authority. Let me go back to the end of verse three. And all the world marveled and followed the beast. Now that. I want you to hear me because it's. It's a little ambiguous here, okay? It says all the world. All the world marveled and followed the beast. Now, I want you to hear me. All the world means all the world, okay? Just letting you know. Okay? It means. It means all of it, all right? Yeah, it means everybody. Okay? Because we're already gone. Yeah. Yeah, because we're gone. Well, I believe we're gone, okay? He says all of the world. Now you can. The ambiguity. There is ambiguity, ambiguity here, okay? It is ambiguous, all right, because the world could refer to those who are of the world, okay? So. So there is an. There is an element of ambiguity here. That. That is. Is prevalent, okay? You can see it. But what it means is, is that he has influence over everybody, okay? He has some influence over everyone. Not an influence that's based. And so many times the Antichrist is pictured as a military leader, which he is, an economic leader, which he is, a. A force of personality, which he is. But the truth is that the whole world is bewitched by him. They think he is wonderful, okay? And they know him to be wonderful. It says here, verse 4. So they worshiped the dragon who gave authority to the beast, and they worshiped the beast. So notice Jesus comes to glorify the Father. So the world worships Jesus, and Jesus points you to the Father. And by the way, that's the way the whole Godhead works. The Holy Spirit unveils Jesus, reveals Jesus to you, so that you might know Jesus and you might worship him. Then Jesus is the full revelation of God so that you can know God and so that you can worship God. Does that make sense? All right, same thing's going on here. The exact same things going on here. He's worshiped so that the beast, or so that Satan might be worshiped. All right, it says, who is like the beast? This is what they say. The people who worship him, who is like the beast and who is able to make war with him. Okay, meaning. Meaning that who's like this guy? No, nobody. He's the greatest leader of all time, okay? He's the. He is the one that everybody is. Is. Is. Is marveling over, and they're saying, who's like him and who can defeat him, who can make war against him? Which is. Is. Is evidence of. He has got. Got great military power. All right, now you need to hear this. If it were to happen today, there's really only one source of military power that could be even close to this, okay? So either this is not going to happen in the next decade or two, or he wields the power of the United States military. If it's going to happen now, it can only happen with him being in control of the United States military. All right? And I know the. The people who like to make weapons. Hey, I am going to get. This is just dragging me down a bunch of trails. I like to tell you how we need to worry about this country and that country and this country and that country, and they can. They going to whoop us, and these folks is going to wear us out, and you know, it's going to be terrible. Okay, all right, you. I'm going to say this again. Military spending. The United States spends this much. The next nine nations on the list don't spend as much as the number one on the list. You do know that. All of them together don't spend as number one. And by the way, if you go to 11 and you add up 11 to 50, they don't spend as much as we do, okay? So we spend half in military spending than the top 49 other nations in the world. Did you know that? You didn't know that? In fact. In fact, and you do need to understand this, military spending wise, there is only two nations in the world that have a. Have a budget, a. A governmental budget as big as our military spending. You need to know this. Y'. All. Y' all are looking at me like. Y' all are. Y' all are amazed by this. You know, there's. Do y' all know how many aircraft carriers There are in the world. There's 25 of them. You know how many of them we have? 12. If you rank them in power, meaning their ability to strike and to move around the world, it's not like the SEC in basketball. Okay, we got number one, three, five, six, nine, 12 and 15. Okay. If you rank them in their ability to their lethal force, our aircraft carriers in the world, you would rank United States number 1, 2, 3, 4, all the way down to 12, and then you'd start with the other ones. In fact, most of them weren't even really aircraft carriers. Okay. The Chinese have two, they're building a third one. They can't even get theirs out in deep water and use it. Okay. It's not even blue water yet. It's not even able to, able to fight on the open seas. Okay. We have, we have fifth generation fighters, which some nations claim they have, but I promise you they're not like ours. And we have the sixth generation, I'm quite sure is ready to go online. So we're actually probably two generation in fighters greater than anybody in the world, right? We are, we're almost into sixth generation fighters. By the way, some people think those fighters are going to be invisible. Yeah. She'll not be able to see them. Okay? So I'm just telling you that you're not going to be able to see them on radar. You're not going to be able to actually see them. Okay? All right. Understanding that, understanding that there's only one military in the world that is the greatest military who can defeat them in the world, and that's us. And that's us going away with it. Okay? That's us going away with it. It's not even close. Not even close. And y' all know that because they pumped us with and they still are trying to tell us this, that this country that's going to be mentioned here in this book, that this country that, that fought in a major war in the middle part of last century. It was a big old, you know, big old booger bear we better be worried about. And they couldn't even whip this little old country on the, on the Black Sea. Okay. Just letting you know they having trouble whooping them. Okay. Do you think they're going to beat the United States with F35 fighters all over the world? No, no, no, no, no. Not even close. You realize we got as many F35 fighters as the Russians may actually have fighters now. You know that, right? It's the F30. F35 is our fifth generation fighter. Right. Well, we have F22 Raptors, which we don't even use now, okay, which are the best in the world. Why am I telling you that? I'm telling you that because so many people want to make things out to be things. If somebody go. If you read somebody teaching you the Revelation, they say, I know who the Antichrist is and I know the nation he's going to lead. Okay? First of all, he better be somebody that everybody else in America knows. And second of all, if you say that he's leading any nation other than the United States right now, that's just not the case, okay? It's just not the case. And why am I telling you that? Well, I'm telling you that just like Paul told the. Told the Church in Thessalonica, okay? He said, it ain't happened yet, okay? And Jesus warned us that the spirit of Antichrist would be in the world. It was already in the world. And so you are going to know. By the way, second, Thessalonians tells them, tells the people of Thessalonians, Thessalonica. He says that the Antichrist will not take power until he has been revealed. Revealed to whom? The Church. He will not take power until he has been revealed. And he's not called the Beast or the Antichrist in Thessalonians. Why is he not called the Beast or the Antichrist in Thessalonians? Does anybody know? Thessalonians was written before the Revelation. Okay? Paul calls him the man of lawlessness. Okay? That's what Paul calls him. All right? Understanding these things help. There's no reason for us to study this without. If I'm not going to tell you the things that give you peace and give you some clear bright lines as to what to expect. Are you following me? There's really no reason for us to sit down and go through this because there's areas of it that quite literally you've seen I'm not sure about. Okay, that's clearly not. I'm not sure about. Well, if that's the case, then why are we studying it? Well, we're studying it because there are some things that are pretty clear, or at least there are things in our day that I know to be true that either don't fit with that or don't fit with the narrative that you hear out in public a lot. Does that make sense? And so I'm better off just telling you. If he's. If no one can defeat him militarily, then either he's got an angel of them helicopter demons that Dean likes. Okay. All right. He's either got them on his side somehow, he's got control of them, or he's got military power that is unmatched in the world. Well, that's only one country. That's it. That's it. And I haven't even gotten into laser weapons and supersonic weapons and all that kind of stuff. Okay. All right. And you'll hear all the time, well, the Chinese are pretty. Listen. Okay? Until we actually see them use it in a way that is. It works. I don't believe the Chinese. Half the stuff I buy from them don't work. Okay. Are you following me? All right, so I want to see. You know, they haven't been involved in military conflict since the early 80s, and they. The last two times they were involved in military conflict, the first time, they got wore out by the Vietnamese, and then the second time they did a little better, but not as. Not. Not real good. Okay. And you say, well, we got whooped by the Vietnamese. Yeah. But since then, we've been spending 10 times what everybody else is spending on the military. Okay. I promise you, it wouldn't go that way this time. Makes sense. All right, you go, Pastor. Why did you get off on that? Because it says, who is like the beast and who is able to make war on him. That means he is definitely somebody that has great power. 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.