The Revelation 17:12-14 | Episode # 1145

March 6, 2026

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

The Revelation 17:12-14

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 Alive, 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.

We're going to do verse 12 to kind of lead into it. So we're in verse 12. Start with verse 12. And we're going to. Going to finish chapter out because there. Well, there's a couple things I do want to say on the front end. You know, when you're. When you're. When you. Well, I don't even know how to put this. If you go down a rabbit hole. Do y' all know what I talk about? A rabbit hole. All right, there's some. There's some rules to going down a rabbit hole, okay? The first rule is to realize you're in a rabbit hole, okay? All right? The second rule is, is that the things that you find out in the rabbit hole might be right and they might be wrong, okay? And so don't think just because you're Alice in Wonderland and you're down there that what's going on is actually reality, okay? Because it might not be, but don't discount it, because it might be. There's some rabbit holes that have turned out to be right, and there's some rabbit holes that turned out to be wrong. And then finally, uh, don't stay in it too long. Uh, it might become your world, okay? All right, so those are. Those are kind of the rules of rabbit holes. And, and there, there are lots of them out there to go down, and some of them are a lot of fun, and some of them will drive you nuts, all right? So don't, don't, don't, don't stay in them too long. Always come out. Not, not. Not saying you can't go down another one later on, okay? But I say that because there are some things that. If you did a Bible study on the book of the Revelation, there are gonna be some things that you'll hear that are. I guess the best way to say is they're the hot topics the hot things that people will talk about in the revelation. And a lot of times these things are discussed and some of the ideas that come from em are just totally out of context. I mean, they're just totally. They're. I mean, they're just. They're out there. The best way for me to say it is. They're just not. It doesn't make sense in the context of the rest of Scripture. And why did I tell you that? Because there's rules for interpretation of Scripture, okay? And those rules are important. The first rule to interpret scripture is if you have a passage and you're trying to figure out what the passage means, then you need to. For sure. First thing, you need to read it in the context of the verses around it, and then you need to read it in the context of the chapters around it. Then you need to read it in the context of the book it's in. And then you need to read it in the context of all of Scripture. And so if you don't first ground your understanding of the word of God, if you don't first ground it in allowing the rest, what I would call the weight of Scripture to rest upon it, then you're likely to come up with some really wild, crazy ideas, right? Like my favorites. And you know, I know they're old dad jokes, but, you know, there's a car in the Bible. Do y' all know that? Bible mentions a car, mentions an automobile. Everybody knows that, right? Did anybody. Anybody not ever heard that, didn't know there was a car in the Bible? Bible says that all the disciples were in one accord. All right? So I mean, it was more like a clown car, but. But it was a car, okay? And of course, this hurts Dean's feelings every time I say it, but the Bible says God said that if you were going to be with him, you need to not fly in airplanes or even helicopters. Did y' all know that? How many of y' all didn't know that? How many of y' all never heard that? Well, the Bible, God said, and lo, I'm with you always. Not up in the air. You know what I'm talking about? So. So, I mean, if you're going to be with God, you got to stay. Now I'm. I give those as. As every time I teach this understanding of scripture. Always give those because, you know, they're just so crazy that they're that. But they. But they do give you the idea. And I always think, the way I try to explain it, if you're going to look at it on a, on a, maybe in a graph type form. I always, always say whatever the word or the passage is or the verse is that you're trying to interpret, you take the rest of scripture kind of like a pyramid and you weigh, you put all of that scripture, you balance it right on top of it so that all the weight of scripture is on that verse. Before you decide what that means. Obviously, when the Bible says that all the disciples were in one accord, that's not a car, okay? That's not a Japanese car, okay? I know that's what Philip drives. And I've never seen the disciples all in that car, okay? It's not a car. It is a state of mind, meaning they were all one of mind and spirit. Now I say that as we're studying this because this passage has one of those things in it, okay? And for me, this passage confirms my ideas that God is in this passage predicting the rise of Islam in some ways and that these 10 horns make sense in our modern times. And if you add the two forces that are in the world that are coming against what I would call modern Christianity, okay? Or evangelical Christianity, and not only that, those things that result from it, such as maybe democracy, maybe capitalism, but definitely freedom, definitely freedom of thought, freedom of ideas, freedom of understanding. If you understand that there's two forces in the world that are doing the best they can to destroy those things, first is Islam, ok? And then the second being communism. But I don't want to use the word communism because I'm going to use the true origin of it, which defines all of the ideas that come out of it, and that's Marxism. And Marxism came from a guy named Karl Marx and his thoughts and ideas are anti God. And they led to the three, the three versions of Marxism that exist in the world, which is communism, socialism and fascism, okay? And so when people say that, you know, something that is, that is capitalistic or when they say that's fascist, what happened was, is that there was a war. I don't know if y' all know that or not. And that war was started by a crazy guy, okay? In Germany. And I want you to hear me. That war did desire to destroy capitalism. But the truth is all the original participants in that war were all Marxist, okay? Russia was a communist Marxist nation. Are you following me? Most of Europe was a, were socialist Marxist. And then of course, Italy and Germany were fascist Marxist, okay? And their ideas conflicted. And there was great desire because all of it, all of them ultimately result in dictatorships, okay? Top down, leadership how they work themselves out are in different ways, but they all ultimately end up with the government and whoever's in the government over them. All right? And so I say that because I believe that. And I've told you I taught it a couple of weeks ago. We didn't tape it, remember when we had all the dust around, we didn't tape it. But I taught those understandings of Marxism and the three things that come from that. And they're all, hear me, they're all godless and they're all evil, okay? They're all godless and they're all evil.

All right?

Now you say, well, is socialism really evil? Yes. Yeah. In its ultimate end, it always results in evil. And by the way, those ideas are the source of as much if not the most killing of human beings in human history, okay? The wars that that have resulted from Marxism have resulted in the killing of at least a half a billion people, if not a billion people since Marx ideas were propagated throughout Europe, okay? All right? And I would challenge you to study those things because I think they're important to study. I've studied them and now I do have an economics degree. And you know, that's one of the things we studied because Marxism ultimately is an economic system, okay? It's born of economics and so how they function ends up being totalitarian dictatorships. But it's born of Marxist ideas about humanity and about how the universe and humans work, which is, I'm going to say this is totally out of line with how God presents humanity and its issues, okay? So, and that's why Marxism is godless. I'm going to say that over and over again. So if you're here for the next 25 years, I'm going to say that over and over again. You need to hear that, okay? Because Marxism is godless, which means by definition it is evil, okay? Period. Full stop. Now, verse 13 is talking about this beast. And we know the beast to be the devil, okay? It says the 10 horns. And you remember when it was described earlier, the ten horns which you saw are ten kings. Now notice it uses the idea of a sovereign, a dictator, one who's in control. Now, I want you to hear me. I'm not totally anti king, okay? Jesus is my king, okay? The God of the universe is my king. So I'm not anti king. I'm just telling you if there's any other king other than Jesus, then he's not the proper king. And the Bible tells us that here. It says here that these are the he Says the ten horns which you saw are ten kings. Notice who've received no kingdom as of yet, which means they are going to be future rulers over future kingdoms. Now, what you'll hear in these rabbit holes is you'll hear about the Ten Nation Confederacy. And one of the things that lots of revelation or end times people like to talk about is they like to talk about the Ten Nation Confederacy. And who is the Ten Nation Confederacy? Now? We. When I was young. When I was young, the ten Nation Confederacy was. We knew who it was, okay? And we knew for sure who it was. And it was the European Union, okay? Because at that time, there were about 10. About 10 countries who were making up the European Union. Now, what's the problem with that? Well, the problem with that is this, that since that time, the European Union has grown to about 18 to 20 nations, okay? I don't know what the actual number is right now, but it's in the high teens, if not early or not low 20s nations. So it's not the European Union, it's not the eu. Okay, and how do I know that? Well, because also, what did it say about these kings? They're not what? Yet? Well, they're not yet. Well, I will say this. If you're going to go European Union, one of them was at least the Italians were right. At least. At least the, the. The. The nation that was based in Rome. Is there a nation based in Rome today? Yeah, now it is 2,000 years later, and it's not quite as powerful as it used to be. And all the buildings have been messed up and marble taken for other uses. Right? But. But that nation still exists. All right? And so it's hard to say that this, when you're, when you're identifying this, that they don't. By the way, Spain in greater, in most, in a greater way of existing still exist and existed back then. So if you're going to say it's the EU, it had to be 10 nations that aren't yet. Now, let's notice something else about them so that we don't go. When we go down the rabbit hole. You got to remember we weigh the scripture in its full context. What I mean, well, if your idea or your understanding gets 90% of it and don't get the other 10, it ain't right, okay? I hear people all the time say, well, I got this prophecy from this person, Pastor. And listen, he messes up on one thing, but the rest of it's really good. I go, oh, They used to have rock concerts for folks like that. You know what I'm talking about? They dance and play music and throw rocks at you, okay? It's called stoning. They'd stone you to death if you got most of it right and one part wrong. Okay? I don't want. I. And, and by the way, the minute somebody says, thus sayeth the Lord, and they're wrong, any stop listening to them. They're saying, I'm giving you a prophetic word from God, directly from God, and it ain't 100% right. And I want you to hear me. It's got to be 100% right all the time. Because God's what? Well, he's omnipresent. So it's got to be right now and it's got to be right tomorrow. And it can't be partially right. So when we're studying God's word, you got to remember, I have to apply to God's word all the attributes of God. Makes sense. Makes. It makes really good sense. It's logical if you'll think about it. It's really logical. He says the 10 horns which you saw are 10 kings who've received no kingdom as yet, but they receive authority for one hour. And this word hour is. Well, it is a finite time period. And, and it's not an hour like we have hours. Does that make sense? Because the hours of the day for the Romans 24, they were, I think, 6 or 12. So you have the third hour and the fourth hour and the fifth hour. And that would last for like six, seven hours. Okay? When you read it, what it means is and what it's giving you. The idea is, is that these, these kings are going to be here for a really short period of time. Really short period of time. He says, not days, but what hours and that, and what he's trying to, what he's trying to get across to you is, you know, they're not here long, all right? But they received authority for one hour as kings, notice alongside the beast. So they are a group of. Group of kings that are going to promote, help, organize, be behind, support the beast. What beast? The beast out of the sea, okay? The, the. The. The leader of, of the one World government and the. Hear me, One World religion, okay? And that one world religion is not going to be Christianity and it's not going to be Islam and it's not going to be Judaism. It is going to be this pagan religion and it is going to inculcate all these other religions because the Muslims are going to follow him because he fits their understanding of who the Messiah is. The Jews are going to follow him because Scripture says they are. All right, I'm going to use this word very loosely. The Christians are going to follow him because they're cultural Christians and not spiritual Christians, and they've been left behind. And they're going to go to church on Sunday morning, and he's going to be sitting on his throne in the new temple. Okay. And they're going to worship him as God in that temple. We're going to see that in a little bit. It says these will make war with the Lamb. Now, notice they're actively against biblical Christianity. They're going to make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb will overcome them. For he is Lord of Lords and King of Kings, and those who are with him are called, chosen and faithful. All right, so is this. Does it. Does this happen right, when this. They show up? No, he's just telling you. He's giving you insight. Remember, when it tells a story, when we get. When we read a section of the Revelation, a. A section of it, it may. It'll start at a point and end at a point. Then it'll move to another understanding. It's another story. And that. That story may be going on contemporaneously with some of the other stories, right? It's like a novel. One of my favorite novels as a teenager to read was Red Storm rising. It's about 800 pages. It's by Tom Clancy, and it's got about five or six storylines in it, and they're all going on at the same time. And he jumps from one storyline to the other, just like a movie. Right? And so those storylines are running alongside each other. And some of them started a little early or ended a little earlier than the other one. Some of them butt up against each other. One of them initiates another one. But remember, the storylines of the book of the Revelation, they start at a point and they end at a point. We know that these kings start late in the story, Right? They are here for just a short little time period. All right, what else do we know about them? That they're kings, but they're not the king. And they are against biblical Christianity. Okay? They're going to be against those who have been converted after the Rapture. All right? They're gonna. They're gonna make war against them. All right, Makes sense. As you're studying, as you think about. They're gonna make war against them. But who's gonna overcome the Lamb? Why is he going to overcome? Because he is Lord of Lords and King of Kings and those who are with him are called chosen and faithful. Those are biblical principles, okay? Those are biblical understandings of how a person. How a person comes to a relationship with God. What are they? Well, they're called. All right? They're called. By who? The Holy Spirit. How do they. How do they hear the call? Because they're born again. All right? Why are they called? Because God chose them. All right? When. When they. When they. When they act on that call, when they have their conversion experience. Modern Christianity calls it being saved. Okay? And it's not wrong to say they're being saved because that is one aspect of salvation. Conversion is an aspect of salvation. But salvation starts at the point you're born again and ends at the point you're glorified. Okay? It's a process. Salvation is a process, all right? Justification is an event that happens by the new birth of the Holy Spirit. And you don't know when it happens because the Holy Spirit acts independently and oftentimes unseen by humanity. All right? And it ends when you're glorified, when you die and you're glorified. Okay? So if you said I was saved, then you wouldn't be wrong, but you wouldn't be totally right, okay? Because Paul says I was saved, and then later on he says I will be saved, and then he says I am saved, present tense. Well, what is he talking about? He's not talking about an event, he's talking about a what? A process. Salvation or sanctification is a process, but the event of being born again is an event. The regeneration event happens by the Holy Spirit and by the way, your conversion experience is an event. And that's what you call being saved. Okay? When you're converted, you go through an event of realization that Jesus is Lord and you submit to that lordship and repent and turn to Him. Makes sense. All right, so we are chosen, called, and then eventually what? Faithful? Because our reaction to that and our reaction being converted is to walk by faith. Okay? So he says that the King of Kings and Lord of Lords is going to handle this because he's taking care of who. Those who are chosen. Called. Chosen and born again and faithful. Right? 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.