In the book of Revelation, humanity is divided into two and only two camps – those who follow Jesus “wherever he goes,” and those who give their allegiance to the “Beast from the Sea.” Members of the former group will not participate in the “Second Death,” but everyone without exception who takes the beastly mark will experience it in the “Lake of Fire.” THERE IS NO THIRD OPTION.
What
determines a person’s fate is whether he or she renders homage to the “Lamb”
or to the “Beast.” This rather graphic image has profound implications
for the disciples of Jesus and their relationship to the State.
MARK OF THE BEAST
The group identified
as the “inhabitants of the earth” consists of men and women who take the
“number of the Beast,” 666, and render homage to its “image.” When
they do so, they acknowledge the “Beast” and the power behind the imperial
throne, the “Dragon,” as their overlords.
And in Revelation,
that “number” is derived from King Nebuchadnezzar’s arrogant claim to absolute
power recorded in the third chapter of Daniel when he commanded all his
subjects to “render homage” to the great golden image he erected. It measured
sixty cubits by six cubits. Anyone who refused to do so was cast into
the “burning fiery furnace.”
Revelation employs this storyline but does so ironically.
The inhabitants of end-time Babylon “render homage” to the “Beast”
and have his name “branded” on their right hand or forehead. Their names
are blotted out of the “Book of Life,” and they are cast into the “lake
of fire that is burning with brimstone.”
In
contrast, the men who follow the “Lamb wherever he goes” are found standing
with the “Lamb” on Mount Zion with the name of his Father “inscribed”
on their foreheads. Rather than the “Lake of Fire,” they inherit
everlasting life in the city of “New Jerusalem.”
What distinguishes the “inhabitants of the earth” from those who “tabernacle in heaven” is not their location but their choice of the “Beast” for their sovereign rather than the “Lamb.”
But the “Beast”
and his minion, the “False Prophet,” are little more than puppets of the
“Ancient Serpent, the Dragon.” Wittingly or not, anyone who renders
homage to the “Beast” or “takes its mark,” in fact, worships the
Devil.
NO MDDLE GROUND
In this scenario,
there is no middle ground or third option. The “Beast” is granted
authority over “over every tribe and
people and tongue and nation,” and in the Revelation, “all”
means exactly that, ALL.
Either you “follow the Lamb wherever he goes” and inherit life, or you render homage to the “Beast” and undergo the “Second Death.” It is one or the other.
So, what
does this mean for disciples of Christ today? First and foremost, they must
decide to whom and what they give their allegiance - to the beastly systems of
the present age, or instead, to the kingdom of God and its sovereign, Jesus Christ.
We may not
yet be living under the tyranny of the final incarnation of the “Beast,”
but sooner or later, he will appear on the world scene. Better to decide now
who we serve before it is too late. And in God’s kingdom, there is no concept
of “dual citizenship,” no room for split loyalties. In the end, only one
kingdom will be left standing on the earth, AND ONLY ONE.
But the
arrival of the final “Beast” will not be something entirely new. History
has seen plenty of attempts by political leaders and governments to dominate all
humanity, regimes that demanded absolute loyalty from everyone within their
domain, and many of them attempted to establish regional and even global empires.
Moreover, the
“Beast from the Sea” is the seventh in a long line of beastly powers. By
John’s time, the first five had already come and gone, the sixth was in power, which
could only have been the Roman Empire, and the seventh had not yet come (“five are
fallen, one is, the other is not yet come; and when he comes, he must continue
a little while”). When its
final iteration does arrive, it will not be the Devil’s first attempt to set up
the World Empire.
Finally, while
Christians are called to obey laws and give due respect to governing
authorities, they must never give them the allegiance and veneration that belongs
to Jesus alone. But if they do so, they will find themselves well on their way
to taking the “mark of the Beast” and undergoing the “second death.”