Revelation 13:3 Commentary - Dr Peter Masters

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Revelation 13:3

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This is of the greatest interest to us, and it’s mentioned repeatedly throughout the chapter. ‘I saw one of his heads’ – only one – ‘as it were wounded to death.’ Seven heads: that is the perfect number; it represents all governments, of all time, but one receives a deadly wound. He is tremendously enfeebled, as good as dead. How does this happen? Obviously this is about some event or age or place where the word of God is widespread, and vast numbers of people are saved. This is a spiritual battle; only the power of God that can effectively counter the power of the beast, and wound one of his heads. It is Daniel who says that, ‘in the days of these kings [the fourth empire from his perspective – Rome] shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed: and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand for ever’ (Daniel 2:44). Only the cross of Christ has the ability to do true damage to the powers of darkness. But this happens repeatedly in history. At times the gospel affects an entire nation, and even secular government has to fall in line and be observant of God’s standards. As a result the beast cannot continue to function as before. He can’t slander and blaspheme; he can’t convince the people that material life and the government is everything, and religion is nothing and needs to be rejected. You could go right back to the period of the early church. There it was persecuted, and yet by the third and fourth century Rome and the Roman Empire – that was a great persecutor – suddenly buckles and yields to Christian teaching, which is everywhere, and even for the moment appears to adopt it. The affairs of state line up behind the Bible to some extent, and the persecutions are brought to an end. But Rome recovered and then a deadly alliance was formed. A false church, the church of Rome, lost its footing over time, found new revelation of its own through its bishops and its popes, drifted completely away from the doctrines of salvation, and entered into league with Roman civil government. So the two became to a great extent one, and the church was serving the world and the world also governed the church, the state church. So the wound was healed and the beast came back in that place in that respect. But alas, his deadly wound was healed; it didn’t last. There was a situation in which the beast couldn’t function and collapsed, but he got over it. So much so that once again he commanded complete authority in that region, and all the world was amazed after the beast – ‘wondered’ is our King James translation – amazed at what had happened, that the beast was revived and functioning again and blaspheming again and persecuting again, and setting up completely contrary values and standards. The beast has survived and revived.You think of the Reformation, right across Europe. Several beasts, heads of state and civil governments, lost their power and the hostility towards the church. The Reformation was influential in this country many years. Even when it’s pure doctrinally influence was lost, it continue to exercise a great restraint on the moral life of the nation. But finally the wound was healed and this country, and this head of the beast recovered and atheism was back. Darwinism came to be accepted and Freudianism and Biblical criticism and theological liberalism: one thing after another, right up to the 1940s and the 1950s. The 1960s brought the revolution of the permissive society, and after that it has gathered speed. Now it’s going at one hundred miles an hour where government rewrites the moral rules for the nation and makes criminal the righteousness of the Scripture. Step-by-step: we have seen it all in our lifetimes. We once had a Sunday day of worship; that got abolished. Then the abortion laws came in. One thing after the other. Civil government: great blows at Christ and the church for the short period of ascendancy the Christian values gained and had. There’s a periodicity about this down the centuries, where in one place and another the beast suffers a defeat, but eventually he comes back and he gains ascendancy once again.

Application

But what perspective this chapter gives you! When you read the books of the late Rev. Tim Keller of New York and his constant emphasis on Christians being called to reform the world and bring about better values throughout the world and a nobler society. It’s completely out of step with the teaching of the New Testament: that this is a doomed world and you cannot reform the world and things will grow worse and worse, and especially bad at the very end for a time. I read a book by the minister-come-psychologist from the United States, Paul Tripp, and it was all about the duty of Christians to reform society, and make the world a better place. Our task is supposed to be transformational of society. But that is totally contrary to the picture of the Bible and this chapter particularly, which shows that Satan’s hostility to Christ and the church is principally channelled through governments. So while we obey governments for law and order – and we are commanded to do so in the Scripture – when it comes to governments determining the morals of a nation, there you see the persecution element of world government: the beast out of the sea.

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Revelation 13:3 Commentary and Bible Study