Prophecy

The False Prophet - PR06-01

Revelation 13:4 says, "And they worship the dragon who gave power to the beast, and they worship the beast." They worship both his master and his servant. This false trinity is in firm control of humanity in this seven-year period. Actually, the people who live in that day are aware of the fact that they are dealing with a false trinity. They are aware of the fact that Satan heads this up and that the man who runs the western confederacy is the antichrist and is Satan's inspired man, and that his false prophet, his agent, is also acting under the authority of Satan.

The Antichrist

He comes to absolute power at a certain point in the tribulation. Have you learned that? Here is the start of the tribulation. The rapture takes place and all Christians go to heaven. Seven years later is the second coming of Jesus Christ. Three-and-a-half years into the tribulation is, obviously, the middle of the tribulation period. This man, the antichrist, comes to power over the ten-nation confederacy at the beginning of the tribulation period. He makes an alliance with the nation of Israel to act as her protector. Things move along for three-and-a-half years in a kind of a cold war status with the antichrist as the protector of the nation of Israel, and with the northern confederacy (headed up by Russia and her East European allies) and the southern confederacy (headed up by Egypt and the Afro Arab nations).

These two powers, on the north and the south, looking at Israel are eager to jump on this fantastically wealthy and prosperous land. However, they are held in restraint because they are afraid of the power of the western confederacy. The ten-nation economic market is forming up in Europe today (seven nations now inviting three more in). We are constantly reading how, when those ten nations get together, they will be infinitely superior economically to the United States of America. We have by far most of the wealth of the people in the world. By far. And this is going to change the balance of economic power radically.

So this man is going to be in a very strong position. But finally, Russia of the north, and Egypt of the South, feel that they can strike. So they move in on Palestine. Then God supernaturally destroys the military forces of Russia and of Egypt. The antichrist doesn't have to do a thing. But when this political vacuum is created, he immediately moves in. And at this point (the midpoint of the tribulation), he now becomes the absolute ruler of the whole world. Up to now, he has only been ruler over the revived ten-nation confederacy. Now he is supreme.

At this point, he no longer needs the ecumenical church that we've been reading about. So he destroys this harlot church. She is no longer useful to him. He is now able to go it alone. So, he destroys this church, but he takes its remnant and he forms a new world religion that becomes the basis of his own world religion. His false prophet becomes his ecclesiastical agent, his right-hand man, in everything he does. And they move into the last three-and-a-half years (which the Bible calls the Great Tribulation, in contrast to the first three-and-a-half years). They move into this last three-and-a-half years, and the Jews are under the most intense persecution that they have ever experienced. This is because the antichrist not only turns against the apostate church, but he also turns against the Jews. He sets himself up in Jerusalem as his headquarters, and, as we shall see, proceeds to set himself up as the god for them to worship.

Revelation 13

That's the picture. Revelation 13:1-10 describe the antichrist. But when we come to Revelation 13:11-18, it describes his right-hand man, the false prophet. We're going to begin to look at Revelation 13:11 which says, "And I beheld another beast." The word "another" in the Greek is "allos." This word means another of the same kind. There is another Greek word "heteros." This word means another of a different kind. For example in Galatians 1:6, Paul speaks about people who come with a "heteros" gospel. It means a gospel of a different kind. It is not a true gospel. It is a totally false gospel.

John 14:16 illustrates the use of this word "allos" in speaking of the Lord Jesus Christ and of God the Holy Spirit. The Lord says, "And I would pray the Father that He will give you another Comforter that He may abide with you forever." Jesus Christ was their comforter while he was on earth. Now He says I'm going to ask God to give you another (an "allos") comforter, one just like Myself, that is, deity again. The other comforter who came, God the Holy Spirit, is also deity as was Christ.

Now the second beast, therefore, is of the same kind as this first one. They are both men; they are under Satan's control; and, they are bestial in their character. That is, you have two human beings who are so satanically controlled that they are totally animalistic in their expression. This second beast is called, in Revelation 19:20, the false prophet: "And the beast was taken (that is, the antichrist) and with him, the false prophet that wrought miracles before him (which we will look at in a moment), and with which he deceived them that had received the mark of the beast (the mark of the antichrist) and them that worship the image of the antichrist. These both were cast alive into the lake of fire burning with brimstone (that is, into hell)."

The false prophet's racial background is not defined. Some people think that he will be a Jew. It seems, however, that it will be unlikely that will be the case. In any case, he is a beast, like the antichrist. He has animal instincts. He is out of the masses of humanity, and he has no divine viewpoint.

We read about this man. "I beheld another beast of the same kind coming up out of the earth." The first beast came up out of the sea which is a symbol in Scripture for nations--the Gentiles. The term earth refers apparently more to the religious climate of humanity. This is some ecclesiastical leader who is living today, in all likelihood, in some ecclesiastical movement. He comes out of that kind of a background. That's what seems to be referred to by the stress upon his coming out of the earth--religion, instead of Christianity. And the mass of human society with its organized religion seems to be the idea here.

In any case, this man is described as having two horns like a lamb. Now what do you think that means? Well, immediately the very mention of a lamb indicates something religious throughout the Old Testament. A lamb was associated with something religious. Horns in the Old Testament refer to authority or power. So what we have here, as we use the normal meaning of symbols as they're used in Scriptures, is that here is a man who has horns of authority of a religious nature that are upon him. Also we are told that he spoke like a dragon. That's not too hard to interpret. He is motivated by the power of Satan, and he speaks under the control of Satan. 2 Corinthians 11:13: "For such are false apostles (deceitful workers), transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ, and no marvel, for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light." Therefore it is no great thing if his ministers also be transformed as ministers of righteousness, whose ends shall be according to their works.

Now what the Word is telling us here is that religious leaders are the people who are going to be viewed as being the spokesmen of God, but, in effect, they will be the spokesmen of this false trinity. We have religious leaders today: just because they are religious leaders; just because they've been ordained; just because they are pastors of churches; just because they wear robes and go through a ritual, they're are viewed as being spiritual authorities. Yet, they are human viewpoint devotees. They have no contact with a knowledge of God. That's the condition that you're going to have here. A man who is under the voice and power and direction of Satan.

Revelation 13:12 tells us where he gets his power: "And he exercises all the power of the first beast before him." The false prophet will exercise the authority of the antichrist who has received his authority from Satan. "And he causes the earth and them who dwell on it to worship the first beast (the antichrist) whose deadly wound was healed." The false prophet directs worship of the whole world to the antichrist, just as the Holy Spirit directs it to the Son. The apostate ecumenical church during the first three-and-a-half years will be riding high. But now it has been destroyed. Now the false prophet comes in to take charge of a religious system that the antichrist himself erects through this man.

Now the whole world responds to the false prophet. The whole world goes wild over the worship of the antichrist. In John 5:43 the Lord says, "I am come in my Father's name, and you received me not; if another shall come in his own name, him you will receive." That's exactly what Revelation 13:8 indicates happens: "And all that dwell upon the earth shall worship him, whose names are not written in the book of life," and so on. The true believers in the tribulation, of course, do not worship the antichrist.

Miracles

Don't ever forget, if you've ever read the story of Job, you should never forget, that Satan can make you sick as a dog. Satan can move in and hit you and knock the wind out of you at some strategic point even of your ministry, and of something that you're about ready to perform that he wants silence upon. That's why you need to be prepared for that and to pray for physical protection against satanic onslaught, for yourself and your ministry, and for those who serve and minister to you. It should be a major item for you.

The Two Witnesses

Finally, in the middle of the tribulation period, he is able to kill these two men. Well the biggest surprise comes three days later when these two men come back to life and that astounds everybody. So they are remembered for the fire that comes from their mouths. Perhaps this is behind the false prophet's choice. The pattern of deception, however, in any case, whatever he does, the various miracles he performs, this pattern of deception was also predicted by the Lord in Matthew 24:24, Jesus said, "For there shall arise false Christs and false prophets, and shall show great signs and wonders insomuch, that if it were possible (which it is not), they shall deceive the very elect." I mean these miracles will be so spectacular that even the few believers that will rise in time in the tribulation period, these believers will look at this and they'll stop and think, "Is this God working? Look at this. Who can do a thing like this? Look at this spectacular site. This must be God." And then they have to put doctrine together, and they have to put the truth together that they're able to come by in those days, and realize, "No, this is not God working. This is Satan working his miracles."

What's the result? In Revelation 13:14, the false prophet is highly successful. It says, "He deceives them that dwell on the earth." That is the unbelievers. He does this by the means of those miracles which he had power to do in the sight of the beast, performing these in the presence of the antichrist as a tribute to his delegated powers to the false prophet. "Saying to them that dwell on the earth (the unbelievers) that they should make an image to the beast that had the wound by a sword and did live." The false prophet, on the wave of all which he has created, by way of these miraculous things that he has performed, suggests to the people of the world that they should now create an image to represent their antichrist, and that he who now dominates and rules the whole world should have his image placed in the temple at Jerusalem, and there he should be worshipped as the true God of all the earth.

Now he is an impressive personality by the fact that he suffered a sword wound which appeared to be of a mortal nature. When everybody looked at this wound, they said, "This fellow is dead." Satan moved in, and he wasn't dead. Satan can't give life, but he can perform the miraculous, and this man survived. This is one of the things that's going to awe people, that a man with a mortal wound has survived. He must be indeed somebody unusual.

It seems a little hard no doubt to you to sit here, with as much as you know of the Word of God, and to be able to enter into the fact that people will believe this guff. However, you have to go back and realize the insanity that possesses a mind which operates on human viewpoint; the utter darkness that surrounds the most brilliant intellect when it is devoid of the knowledge of the Word of God. Unless you have the balancing principles of divine truth, your physical eyes will see things and your mentality will constantly misinterpret. The only way you can interpret what is taking place before your physical eyes is when you have a soul that's oriented to the Word of God.

The Abomination of Desolation

Why is it getting to be such a terrible time? Because it happens to be this time right here in the middle of the tribulation period. The antichrist is riding in a dominant position, and he has turned against the Jew. He has turned against those with whom he made an alliance. So now, Matthew 24 says when you see this abomination of desolation, when you see this abominable image placed as an object of worship in our temple, that's the time for you to get out and flee to safety in the hills of Judea, and not even to turn back to pick up anything, but to move, because the antichrist is going to put in motion the greatest anti-Semitic movement of all history. This is the fulfillment of the big lie--the belief in the big lie--that 2 Thessalonians 2:11 speaks of when it says, "And for this, God shall send them strong delusion that they should believe the lie."

Now here is the religion that the false prophet promotes, beginning in Revelation 13:15. His advice apparently is taken. The people of the world create this image and it's placed in the temple. Now the false prophet comes in and we are told that he has power to give life unto the image of the beast. Now this is not a good translation. It is not "life." The Greek word life is "zoea." This is not the Greek word for life here. This is the Greek word "pneuma." This word means "spirit" or "breath." Satan does not have the power to give life. He cannot give this power to the false prophet to make this image live. But what he does is that he gives the false prophet the miraculous power to give the illusion of life. People will walk in, and here he is performing his miracles in the presence of the antichrist. This magnificent image has now been set up. The television cameras are on it, and all the world is moved to the unveiling of this focal point of all the worship of the world. And suddenly, you can hear the murmurs of astonishment around the world as the image begins to breathe and to move. And people say, "What a wonderful God we have in the antichrist. Look what his prophet is able to do."

Now that's not too hard to believe. What you have here is a super Disneyland. Several years ago, I took the jungle trail trip in Disneyland. As I came across one bend, I was fiddling around with my camera changing film. And we turned the bend and there was water spraying up as I looked up, and there through the spring were a group of elephants. Their trunks were in the water, and they were taking water and they were shooting it up in the air. And I said to someone, "Well look at that. They have live elephants here. I wonder how they keep them in there." And I wasn't kidding. And it wasn't until the boat got up close that I saw that these were not live elephants. These were just Disney elephants, but they looked like the real thing--the really real thing. They were better at blowing the water out of their trunks than any real elephant I've ever seen. They were excellent. This is not spectacular. It's easily accomplished by somebody who has vast technological information, and the miraculous powers that Satan has.

So what the image does is it begins to breathe. It has the illusion that it has come alive. And if that isn't enough, he adds another touch. This guy has a great sense of drama. He's a real entrepreneur. While the world is awed by the movement of this image, they suddenly discover something else about it. For we read that it speaks, and he makes this thing talk. Now what marvelous declarations can come from this image whom they worship? And that makes it all easier to worship. The thing looks alive. The thing can talk. If humanity has any reticence about worshiping a dumb idol, this helps to remove it a great deal, in the delusions that exist on their minds.

Now again this is a falsehood. It isn't really speaking. It is a deception which is practiced. It is not difficult at all for Satan because he does it all the time today. Maybe some of you people have attended a séance. It's bad business if you did. But if you should have attended a séance, one of the things you will discover is that the medium begins to speak in an unnatural and different voice than his own. What is happening is that the medium has been possessed by a demon spirit. They purport to speak to somebody from beyond the grave. You can never contact somebody who has died, but you can hold a séance, and with a demonically possessed person, you can get a demon to speak through that person and to deliver messages.

This is commonly practiced. It is part of the rising tide of religious interest in our day in spiritism, even among ecclesiastical leaders such as the late Bishop Pike who was a great promoter before his death of the whole concept of communication with spirit beings. So this is done all the time. It's no problem for Satan to dispatch one of his demons to start operating the talking mechanism, so to speak, of the image himself. People can even look and say, "Look, there's no mechanism here. There's no device. There's no trickery." And yet they hear this thing talk.

In Acts 16 we have this condition. Acts 16:16 says, "And it came to pass as we went to prayer (Paul and Silas), a certain maid possessed with a spirit of divination met us who brought her masters much gain by soothsaying." Here was this little girl who was possessed by a demon, and she could tell fortunes. She could deliver messages from the demonic world. "The same followed Paul and us and cried saying, 'These men are the servants of the most High God who showed unto us the way of salvation.'" God overrode the demon and declared a truth to the girl. The result was that Paul healed her, and then she was no longer able to communicate with the demonic world, and this angered her owners against the apostles.

The tribulation's humanity will go wild in its worship of this concrete evidence of the false trinity in action. The authority of the false prophet is from the antichrist, so it is absolute. So what happens to the people who are believers, for there will be believers. They refuse to worship this image. Revelation 13:15 says, "As many as would not worship the image of the beast should be killed." He has absolute authority over them, and those who refuse will be executed. Revelation 7:9-17 describe to us the many many believers who will be martyred in the tribulation period, many of them for this very reason that they refuse to worship this image.

Revelation 13:16 says, "And he causes all both small and great." Now notice the categories. Everybody here is going to be required to worship the image which represents the antichrist. It covers all classes of humanity. It says, "The small and the great." Whatever your status in society, you will be expected to worship the image. "Rich and poor." Whatever your economic status in society is--your wealth in society. You will be expected to worship the image. "Free and enslaved." Whatever your condition in society is at the time, you will be expected to worship the image. Those who do worship will receive a mark to identify them as worshipers of the beast. This will be in their right hand or on their forehead, and it will be branded in there. This is an imitation again, another counterfeit, of the seal that God the Holy Spirit places and is Himself upon every believer.

Revelation 13:17 tells us one other thing. The false prophet has great economic controls: "And that no man might buy or sell, except he that had the mark or the name of the beast or the number of the name." You will not be able to conduct business, and you will not be able to buy the necessities of life without this mark upon you. Satan's creed about man is summed up in the book of Job. Job 2:4 says, "And Satan answered the Lord and said, 'Skin for skin, yea, all that a man has will he give for his life.'"

Now believers who operate on divine viewpoint will not do this. We read in Revelation 12:11, "And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, and they loved not their lives unto the death." There are some people in the tribulation period who will die rather than submit to this mark. This mark bears upon it eternal damnation. Once you get this mark, once you have accepted this mark, you are doomed.

Revelation 14:9-11 says, "And the third angel followed them saying with a loud voice, 'If any man worships the beast (the antichrist) and his image, and receives his mark in his forehead, or in his hand, the same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation, and he should be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb (that is, Jesus Christ). And the smoke of their torment ascended up forever and ever and they had no rest, day nor night, who worship the beast and his image, whoever receives the mark of his name.'" Once you have received this mark, you are eternally doomed; you are eternally condemned before God; and, there is no way back. So this is a serious thing once you say, "Okay, brand me." But economic survival will be the issue. It's the rising element of control in our day.

I can remember a time not so many years ago when it was unthinkable that you should come to a man who worked for a company and say, "Friend, we just decided that we want you to go home and tell your wife to start packing. We want you to go to the school and tell your principal that your children are being transferred. We are going to move you 1,500 miles to the north to our office up there. We want you to sell your house. We want you to be ready to go in two weeks. Call your friends and let them know."

Corporations have no hesitancy in doing this. I wonder sometimes why the radical youth haven't caught on to that little principle. I might almost be willing to join the weirdos on that one--to step out and strike at corporations who can take a person and twist his life, and tell him that either he goes or his job is lost. We've had some splendid people right here in this church who went through all kinds of agonies when the company said, "You're moving." And I've had them go both ways. I've had them tell the company where they could go, and I've had them accept it when the company told them where they could go. You do it one way or another, but it depends on how oriented you are to the Word of God as to which way you'll go.

This is part of the thing we struggle with around here--parents who are so blighted spiritually that they permit their youngsters to have jobs that will interfere with spiritual activities. I lose more kids in the band; I lose more kids in club; and I lose more kids in activity around here because they've got a job, and they think it's great. You get down to about the lowest level you can when you tell your son or your daughter, "You can have a car of your own as long as you have a job to pay for it. We regularly have these kids who come along. We had one on the street not so long ago. Spiritually zilch. Gone. He got his vehicle, and he got his job, cranking it out, but for the rest of his life he'll pay for it. And they say, "Well, I don't know. He doesn't seem to want to do anything else but this."

I'd like to be in their place and go up to that kid and grab him by his tie and brace him up against the wall and say, "What is it that you told me about that job you wanted?" Here are these parents who gave life, and they're not willing to stand up and have a draw on a shootout with a kid who's telling them that they're going to have a job come hell or high water, and, "You try to do something about it, daddio." Well, that's pathetic. It's a disease of our society. You kids should be glad if you have parents who will stand up and pin your ears back and say, "You don't earn a cent that ever interferes with spiritual activity."

Some come around and they want to justify it to me. They say, "Well, I'm going to be able to go on the trip camp next summer." I'm thinking up ways to cut them out of it. They, say, "Yeah, I'm going to go on the trip camp next summer, and that's why I'm working. I'm going to earn this. Also, I've got to have this car because sometime I might meet a missionary who needs a ride to church." I mean they just get really weird on the justifications. But that's this economic control. We have it all around us. And in the end times, that's the thing, because if you don't come through, you're going to die. This is what communism can do to a person. Communism doesn't have to do anything but pull your card, and without your card you can't buy; you can't go to a grocery store; you can't sell; and, you can't draw your money from the bank, and in a communist country they don't have to touch you. They just have to pull your means of being able to secure the necessities of life, and starve you to death, unless you can survive by the gifts of your friends who then have put themselves in the process.

People are going to be caught between the soul-deluding miracles of a false prophet and their own self-preservation. They're going to eagerly seek to have this mark branded on themselves which is going to condemn them to eternal damnation. That's how deluded and benighted people will be.

666

The end of the false prophet is in Revelation 19:20: "And the beast was taken and with him the false prophet that wrought miracles before him with which he deceived them that had received the mark of the beast, and them that worshipped his image. These both were cast alive into a lake of fire burning with brimstone." They are cast into hell. This takes place at the end of the tribulation period at the return of Jesus Christ. His power comes to an end as Christ returns to set up his world government of peace.

Dr. John E. Danish, 1971