The Antichrist & The False Prophet (Things to Come Part 2)

Thank you for listening to this message from the ministry of Morse Corner Church in Leverett, Massachusetts. Morse Corner is a non-denominational church that is committed to the preaching and teaching of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Our church was founded in 1896 by two students of the famous evangelist D .L. Moody. We seek to encourage and edify the body of Christ through the proclamation of God's word through the ministries of the local church.

If you'd like more information, visit our website, morsecornerchurch .com. We hope you enjoy the message. We're going to go to the book of Daniel, so go ahead and turn there. Old Testament book of Daniel, chapter 7.

A lot of connections between Daniel and Revelation. We need to establish this as to rightly interpret what's happening here. So, in the book of Daniel, there's this mentioning of beasts. And basically, we're going to see that a beast refers, can refer to a man.

That's true, the leader of an empire. But it refers to a government system, an empire. And in Daniel, we're going to see the governments of Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece, and Rome. These government systems are portrayed as beasts.

This is a well-attested fact of history. These are successive world empires. Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece, and Rome. So, all of that to say this, and this is moving on to point number two. The mark of the beast will be imposed.

The mark of the beast will be imposed by a world empire. Alright? In Revelation 13, the beast is what then? The mark of the beast is going to be the mark of an empire. An empire, and the man leading it will impose the mark of the beast.

Alright, Daniel 7, verses 1 through 3. It says, in the first year of Belshazzar, king of Babylon, Daniel, this is a prophet of God, had a dream. And visions of his head while on his bed. Then he wrote down the dream, telling the main facts.

Daniel spoke, saying, I saw in my vision by night, and behold, the four winds of heaven were stirring up the great sea. And four great, what?

Beasts.

Beasts came up from the sea, each different from the other. Obviously, we read that in Revelation. A beast rising up out of the sea. So, let me just stop there and say, obviously, Daniel and Revelation are connected.

So, if you want to properly understand what's in Revelation,.

You've got to look at Daniel.

And certainly to understand Daniel, you have to look at Revelation. So, these are the main books of Bible prophecy. Daniel in the Old Testament, Revelation in the New Testament. So, John writes about the mark of the beast.

The beast is symbolic. Okay, that is symbolic. He's not saying the mark of the wild animal. This is a mark of an empire, really. But he's telling people, don't take the mark. That's what John is telling to believers.

But in Daniel 7 verse 4, we don't have time to give a full explanation. So, you just kind of take note of this or make note. The first beast in Daniel 7 verse 4 is like what?

What animal?

What beast?

A lion. So, this represents Babylon. The second beast in verse 5 is like what? Yeah, that's the lion. But the second beast is a bear. And the bear represents Medo-Persia. The third beast in verse 6 is like a leopard.

And this represents Greece. And if you went to school, you know about the empire of Greece, right? Who is the leader of it? One of the most famous men in world history. Right, Alexander the Great who died at age 33.

I believe it was.

Very young.

And in his youth, he conquered basically the known world at the time. It's interesting. Verse 6 says that that beast representing Greece also had four heads. And dominion was given to it, you know, after Alexander's early demise.

Guess what?

His empire was divided up among his four generals. So, the prophetic element of the scripture, it's just dead accurate. Then in verse 7, the fourth beast, and this is the one we are most concerned about.

The fourth beast was unlike any of the others. Look at verse 7. It says, after this, I saw in the night visions, and behold, a fourth beast, dreadful and terrible, exceedingly strong. It had huge iron teeth.

It was devouring, breaking in pieces, and trampling the residue with its feet. So, in point number 2, remember we're talking about empires here. It says it was different from all the beasts that were before it, and it had ten horns.

What empire is this referring to?

Rome.

Okay, this is the Roman Empire. So, we are seeing that these beasts are not only the empire, they can also be pictured, or they picture the rulers of the empire, right? The lion is Babylon, but it's also Nebuchadnezzar.

So, it's the empire and the man who kind of personifies. The empire. So, the image of the head of gold. We don't have time to go back to Daniel chapter 2, but remember he has this dream, the king does, of this great image, right?

And there's another connection where there's the image of the beast in Revelation. Well, Nebuchadnezzar made an image. And that statue, that image, had a head of gold, chest and arms of silver, belly and thighs of bronze, and legs of iron.

And the important part there is that the legs and the legs of iron had feet that were partially iron and partially clay. So, this is successive world empires. But the thing about the fourth empire, Rome, is it's iron, but then it's iron mixed with clay.

And we believe, most prophecy scholars agree, there will be another Roman Empire to come. Okay, a revival of the Roman Empire. Look at Daniel 7 verse 8. Daniel says, And I was considering the horns, and there was another horn, a little one, coming up among them, before whom three of the first horns were plucked out by the roots.

And there in this horn were eyes like the eyes of a man, and a mouth speaking pompous words. So, long story short, this horn, a horn represents power and authority, horns are kings. This little horn is who?

This little horn is the man we identify as the Antichrist. He will rise up from the revival of the Roman Empire in the last day. You say, well, this whole idea of the Antichrist, is that in the Bible?

Absolutely.

1 John chapter 2 verse 18. John, the author of Revelation, he said, It is the last hour. We are living in the last age. Nothing else has to happen before these things start to take place. He says, this is the last hour.

And as you have heard, that the Antichrist is coming. Okay, the Antichrist is coming. See, as Christians, we're looking for who? We're looking for Christ. The world is looking and waiting for the Antichrist.

Now, they don't even know it because they've been blinded and deceived. They don't even understand this. We're looking for Christ. The world is looking for Antichrist. Isn't the world looking for someone to rise up and have the solutions?

A man who can fix and bring peace to the Middle East? The world would follow after a ruler like that and indeed they will. So, he is coming and the Antichrist, or the beast that comes out of the sea, he will be the ruler of this final world empire, revived Rome.

And this revival of the Roman Empire will be different from the original Roman Empire. There will be similarities. There will be differences. So, we're still in Daniel. One more point here. You know, Jesus, the Antichrist, means one who stands in the place of Christ.

He's not just against Christ, anti, that's what you think of. But the word anti in Greek actually means one who stands in the place of Christ. Jesus had his prophet, right? His forerunner, who was it?

John the Baptist. Well, guess what? The Antichrist will have his hellish John the Baptist, the false prophet. So, the Antichrist will have his false prophet. He will lead this one world religion, which is headquartered in Rome, according to Revelation chapter 17, verse 9, the city on seven hills.

Now, look at verse 23 of Daniel. Thus, he said, the fourth beast shall be a fourth kingdom on the earth. It'll be Rome and then revived Rome, which shall be different from all other kingdoms and shall devour the whole earth, trample it and break it in pieces.

The 10 horns are what? 10 kings who shall arise from this kingdom. And another shall rise after them. This is the Antichrist or the little horn. And he shall be different from the first ones. And he shall subdue three kings.

And he shall speak pompous words against the most high and shall persecute the saints of the most high and shall intend to change times and law. Okay, this is just my opinion. All right, we're trying to stick to what we know.

This is just my opinion. It's only a matter of time before a world ruler will say, well, here's a 2021 based on what? The birth of Jesus. We need to get rid of that. We need to scrap that and change to a different calendar.

I would watch for that. Says then the saints shall be given into his hand for a time and a times and a half a time. This refers to a period of 42 months or three and a half years. This is the time period that Jesus in Matthew 24 referred to as the great tribulation.

All right.

That's a lot of information.

I know.

But stay with me.

Okay.

You still with me?

Amen.

All right.

Go back to Revelation chapter 13. Again, we don't have time to get to in depth and explain everything here in just one message, but that should be enough context to show that the beast is referring to or a beast refers to an empire, but also the man who personifies an empire.

And we believe the first beast in Revelation chapter 13, which we read about in the scripture reading, he will lead a political empire.

Okay.

Revive Rome. The second beast who does his bidding, the false prophet, he will lead a religious empire again, headquartered in Rome. Revelation 17 verse nine. This false religion has a name,.

Right?

We don't have time to turn to Revelation 17, but what's the name of this false religion? The whore of Babylon. And don't get offended. That's in the King James version of the Bible, but that's what it's called.

The whore of Babylon. Why is it called that? Or the great harlot?

Well,.

Because this false religion is basically in bed with the kings of the earth, and they are using her to accomplish their purpose. And once the 10 kings, here's another thing to look out for. The earth will probably be divided into 10 regions and one king per region.

But these 10 kings, once they use this false religious system to get power, they will destroy this false church, or they will destroy the harlot of Babylon. And then once they have their power, what do they do?

They give it all to this one man,.

The antichrist.

And he effectively becomes the one world dictator from hell. So when the mark of the beast is instituted, expect to see the world's preeminent religious leader to be the one pushing the mark. Revelation 13 verse 11, the second beast or the false prophet.

In the vision,.

If you look,.

John sees that he has two horns like a lamb.

Well,.

A lamb is a very peaceful creature,.

Right?

Nothing to worry about there.

Unfortunately,.

He does what? He speaks like a dragon. He seems like a man of peace, but his words, his doctrine is straight out of the pit. Thanks for listening. I'm Pastor Michael Grant from Morse Corner Church. If you'd like to listen to the complete message, or if you'd like more information about the ministry, visit our website,.

Morsecornerchurch .com.

And we'd love to have you join us some Sunday morning here in Leverett. Until next time, with the grace of God,.

Be with you.