The Revelation 17:5 | Episode # 1139

February 26, 2026

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

The Revelation 17:5

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.

That is prophecy books that have been written in the past.

It's probably the source material for most of the books that are written about prophecy. It's one of the source materials. You have the Olivet Discourse where Jesus tells us about the end times in Matthew,

I think it's 26, 27, and 28 or 20.

Maybe I'm wrong about that. Maybe it's 24, 25 and 26.

It's called the Olivet Discourse where he talks to his disciples and tells them a lot of things about what's about to happen.

You have the book of second Thessalonians. Thessalonians,

which is actually a book to a church or group of people who thought that the rapture had already happened. They thought that the church had already been taken out. By the way, if somebody says to you that the rapture is a new idea in Scripture, well, that's not true because the book of 2 Thessalonians was written to the Thessalonican church because they believed after they got the first book and he mentioned that we would be taken away.

They believe that they were left behind. Okay, so 2 Thessalonians is the original left behind book. Okay? It's the original one.

And so it is three chapters and especially chapter two goes into detail about the end times. And we gain a lot of understanding about that. And then also we gain a lot of understanding from a lot of Old Testament books.

A lot of the minor prophets mentioned things that happen in the end times.

And then the major prophets, there's a lot and go out and happen, okay? And they tell you this is how it's going to take place. And I remember that happening as a child.

For me,

when I was either an older grade schooler or a young adult,

there was a book that came out that dealt with the end times. And it was really big. It was really big. And everybody talked about it was called the Late Great Planet Earth by Hal Lindsey,

okay? And it was a book that dealt with the end times and it made some predictions trying to look at what was going on about what those things might represent.

And I'm going to tell you that you can,

you can do that. I mean, you can do that and you can do that well,

but I'm going to tell you you can't do it perfectly or accurately,

okay? And the reason you can is because the things that you perceive are necessary. This is going. This is a part of what's going to happen in the time period that I've been alive.

Let's say that it was written 40 years ago, but I think it was probably written maybe even a little bit before that in the late 70s.

That book has become dated because some of the predictions that were made in that book as his view of what he thought might be taking place have, Have. Have come to be not true.

Okay? And that's not to say that he was wrong, and that's not say that he was trying to be. He was trying to be prophetic and tell us what. What was going to happen or the day of the hour.

He's just trying to dig through it. And so when. And so when we've been studying through the Revelation, and I've said this to y' all before, but sometimes I need to say it mult.

When we're staying through the book of the Revelation, I try not to be dogmatic about things that I'm not 100% sure that represents that. I try to give you other ideas, what other people think it might mean.

And then I try to give you what I think it means from my perspective. But that doesn't mean that that's the way it's going to be, because let's say you take the.

And one of the books that's in the Bible study is I think we have Daniel. Is Daniel in there?

I don't think Daniel's in there yet.

But you have the prophecy of the four kingdoms,

the four beasts, okay? And the first prophecy, if he gave that. When Daniel gave that prophecy, he gave that prophecy while he was in Babylon. Okay?

And it's clear from the imagery and from the way the first kingdom is described. And I'm bringing this up because I'm gonna go back to it later on. It's clear from the imagery that, that he's talking about the first kingdom in the vision God gave Daniel.

The first kingdom is Babylon.

All right?

The second kingdom,

they probably could have figured out who the second kingdom was, because the second kingdom was just north of Babylon and it was a growing power. And it's Persia, what we call modern day Iran, or the Persians.

All right? And the Persian empire is described a certain way,

and it's a perfect representation of how the Persian empire came to power.

And in fact, the Persian empire, when it came to power, it was actually two empires that merged.

The Medes and the Persians. And so you have both of those kingdoms that are mentioned, and it spells it out.

Now, the third kingdom,

they would have had no clue what it was because it was a ram that came out of the, came out of the west,

came into the east and struck the second kingdom and, and totally destroyed it.

Well, nobody at the time Daniel wrote that could ever have imagined that some backwater people in the northern Greek peninsula called Macedon would have an army that could march across the entirety of Persia and defeat the Persian army not once, not twice, but three times.

Okay?

In the Macedonian army, okay? Nobody would.

We are today.

I would have to presuppose a lot of things. And you know what would happen?

I would be wrong.

Because Macedon was, was nothing. Nobody, nobody.

Macedon was not nothing.

Nobody in Babylon or Persia would have even recognized that as something that would even likely happen. And then the last kingdom is, is, is Rome and, and, and the Roman Empire.

Nobody could imagine that there would be an empire rise up that would basically control all of Europe and most of the Middle east and all of North Africa.

Nobody would have ever imagined that that was possible.

And so when we're studying this,

what I'm telling you is, is people will say this and listen, as we get older and things get worse around us,

okay? Let me, let me say this.

Things aren't worse. People are just as evil as they have ever been. Okay? Let me say that to you. You're just recognizing how terrible it is. Okay? When you were young, you had your eyes blind and you tried just your best to keep up, make a family and feed your kids,

and you didn't recognize how terrible it is. Now that you get to sit and watch CNN and, and Fox News and MSNBC and a bad dude.

You have a very limited perspective.

Things are terrible,

but 50 million people aren't being killed in this decade in a war that spanned most of the world.

That was bad.

Okay?

And, and, and therefore,

don't allow your reading of scripture.

Don't allow your reading of scripture to be so influenced by just your experience.

That's why it's necessary that you lean on the Holy Spirit. And allow the Holy Spirit to reveal to you his word. Because you come from a very,

very limited perspective. And every human being that's ever existed does.

Every one of us do happen. And I'm just here to tell you that what you perceive is got to happen or is going to happen most good. But the whole time you was worried about what was going to happen.

Am I right?

Well, if that's the case for you right now,

that's always been the case for you.

You really don't know until God shows it to you.

You don't know.

And don't play games with yourself about how things are going to work out.

And don't.

Don't allow the enemy to make you nervous, scared,

worried. You spend your life about what could be.

When God quite clearly says he's ordered the steps of the righteous, he knows what he's doing.

You don't have to do that. And what you'll do is you'll. You'll spend your life looking at the world and not looking for God,

okay? You'll. You'll.

Yeah. Really? That's true. All right. Verse 5.

All right,

this is the woman that rides the beast. Okay?

Now I'm going to tell you, I'm going to give you, Give you understandings that have been historical understandings of what these mean, and then I'm going to tell you what I think they mean.

Okay? All right.

He says, and on her forehead was the names. These names were written. This is the name of the woman, which is the adulteress, which is the.

She's called the ***** of Babylon, okay? She. And she's a picture of false religion. Remember a.

In the, in scripture, if it's a young lady who's virtuous, it's a picture of the church. If it's an older lady and she's virtuous, usually picture the Old Testament or the Jews, okay?

And then if it's a woman that's not virtuous, it's a picture of false religion, okay? Almost exclusively. You run across somebody like that, almost exclusively, it's false religion. Okay. All right,

we're in chapter 17.

All right, and then verse five, it said on her foreheads there was a name written.

Mystery.

Doubt how God's going to do this.

He's telling you I've made it a mystery.

It's mysterious.

Now, we do know that it comes from. Because he's already talked about it, we do know that it comes from the historic false pagan religion that began in Babel,

that was began by Nimrod who is the great. Really? One of the first great world conquerors. And he didn't conquer the world, but he had empire maker, okay? And he made his empire right near where the Garden of Eden was, which is at the lower part of the Euphrates and Tigris river,

either right on the land or somewhere right out in the middle of the Persian Gulf.

If, if, if the, if the Pushan, I can't remember what river it is. The one river that we don't know which river it is.

There is a riverbed,

there's a wadi, a giant wadi that comes out of Saudi Arabia that pours into. Either in the land or right into the Persian Gulf.

So right near where Eden took place is where Nimrod built.

Built a tower to make his name great,

okay?

So that he could have a name as great as God. I want you to notice that's the same thing the devil wanted. He wanted to be worshiped as God was, okay?

Nimrod did the same thing. And that's where God confused their languages.

Okay?

That religion that he created,

which is a. Which is a. Which is a pagan religion,

spread all over the world.

Okay, how did it spread all over the world? Well, it started in Babel,

later to be known as Babylon.

And then there was a nation that took them over called the Persians,

and they inculcated that religion.

Have y' all heard about this? And then after that, there was this unbelievably famous dude who came out of Macedon and he.

He destroyed that nation and, and, and attacked all the way to India and all the way down into. Into Egypt. His name's Alexander the Great. And what did he do?

What did his men get mad at him about?

Because he took on the religion of what,

the Persians.

So that religion was carried on into Per. I mean, carried on into Baba, into Greece in the Greek city states, and. And then the Romans,

when they took over, what did they do? They inculcated those religion, that religion into them. And from that moment on,

that. That pagan religion that's based off of the worship of a female deity,

any number of several of those names,

and gives birth to a son who is gored by the constellation in heaven, Taurus.

That false religion has been passed down from generation to generation since then.

And it is a pagan religion and you practice it in some ways and you don't even know it. Okay, I'm just telling you that. And it's a mystery.

How can God redeem a people out of such terrible paganism?

Well, the reason he can do that is because he's God.

Okay?

God can do what you can't imagine that he can do.

Does that make sense to you? She's a mystery.

Babylon the Great,

the mother. Notice,

the mother of harlots.

Does that mean she's the mother of prostitutes?

No,

she.

She's the mother of all the false religions.

It doesn't mean that she's the mother of all the prostitutes. That's not true.

Remember, prostitutes or unrighteous women in the Bible are pictures of false religion.

Okay?

The virtuous young lady is a picture of the New Testament Church.

The virtuous older lady is a picture of the Jews and a picture of the Old Testament pastor. You already said that. I know, but y' all didn't even remember that.

That there were four great, great nations that the Babylonians passed their religion onto. It was like a. It was like a.

A religiously transmitted disease that they passed on to other people.

Seems appropriate for right here it says,

Babylon the Great, the mother of harlots and the abomination of the earth. Notice he says that that religion is the primary abomination of the earth.

It is the worship of man over the worship of God.

All right,

so we know that that false religion exists.

And listen to me. And it has been inculcated in all kinds of things. You do.

You all do it.

Some of you started doing it recently.

You know, when. When, When?

On Fat Tuesday. Y' all know. Y' all know that Ash Wednesday,

okay,

When. When you go in and put the ashes on your head.

Okay?

I know the.

The Catholic Church does it, but the Methodist and the Episcopal Church now do it. All that.

That tea,

putting it on your forehead comes from that false religion.

It's the worship of that child that was gored by that ox.

His name was BAAL Tammuz.

Okay? And when you greeted somebody on the road, if you were a worshiper of tamu, you do this.

Did you know that you would.

Okay, I'm just telling you that. And some people going, well, you getting on the Catholics? No, The Catholic church has had 2000 years to mess things up. We've only had a few.

Okay? All right? Anytime you put a group of people in charge, human beings in charge of an institution, they gonna mess stuff up,

okay? And remember, it says that this. This. This lie, this harlotry of this woman is. She's the mother of it.

And. And she passes it on throughout the earth.

So all the time, it's. It's inculcating what we do.

That worship that false religion, that teaching, that you can be God.

Okay, you're not God.

You are made in the image of God,

but you're not God. You are not big God.

Okay, Now, Sunday we're going to talk about Jesus saying that we're little gods.

Okay, and what does he mean by that? Well,

we are made in the image of God,

and we possess the power of God.

So, yes,

we are.

As if God is.

And the angels wonder about us. In fact,

we're amazing to them how something so broken and messed up could not only be made in the likeness of God, but could retain the power of God.

All right, we'll talk about that Sunday.

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.