Today, I am reading and commenting on Revelation 13-16.

I want to start by writing about the power of the beasts.  The dragon, which we were told in yesterday’s passage is Satan, gave his power and authority to the first beast.  People worshiped the dragon because it had given power to the first beast, and they worshiped the first beast because it had the power which the dragon gave it.  A little later the second beast arose and exercised the power of the first beast on behalf of the first beast.  This second beast performed signs and wonders using the power of the first beast.  As a result, it was also worshiped.  Finally, the second beast created a statue of the first beast and gave it powers so that all who refused to worship this image of the first beast were killed.  All of this reminds me of some corporate shell games we see played today, where one company owns another company, which owns a third company, and so on.  The first several companies exist mostly to hide the actual owners from accountability.   So, what I am seeing is that the beasts and the statue will exist to allow people to pretend that they are not worship Satan, are not worshiping evil itself.

Then the second beast requires people to receive its mark.  I realized this morning that the beast’s mark is an imitation of the seal which God had placed on the foreheads of His servants.  While nowhere in Revelation does John spell out this imitation, he does make it clear that one cannot bear the mark of the beast and the seal of God at the same time.  Which suggests to me that while I think the mark of the beast has a physical manifestation its essence is something spiritual which is separate from its physical manifestation.  However, the important thing is that we understand that having the mark of the beast is incompatible with having the seal of God.  We cannot have both at the same time.  There may come a time, indeed there may be multiple times throughout history, when we need to choose between being able to take part in the economy of this world and serving God.  We need to be willing to suffer severe economic hardship in order to serve God.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.