Good morning. This morning we're looking at a passage in the book of Revelation. It's the last book in the Bible. And we're looking at Revelation chapter 13. We're just going to look at one verse today. And as you can see in your bulletin, the sermon title is 666. That's not a hymn number.
It's the number that Jesus gave to the first century church to help them recognize and identify the enemy of the church and to respond appropriately. And that's what we want to do today as we look at this passage, Revelation chapter 13 verse 18, and have a better understanding of what this means to us today, this number 666. Revelation chapter 13 verse 18, this calls for wisdom. Let the one who has understanding calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man, and his number is 666.
Let's pray. Lord God, you are a God who speaks truth and that truth comes into the darkness like a shining light and exposes those things that are hidden in the darkness. And indeed we have an enemy that prowls about like a roaring lion seeking to devour us and he disguises himself in many ways. And yet, Lord God, you reveal to your church who he is and you empower us and enable us to respond appropriately with our eyes fixed on Jesus. Help us to fix our eyes on Jesus this morning as we seek to understand how to apply this passage to our church today. All for your glory in Jesus' name.
Amen. It is difficult for a foreigner to understand the meaning of symbols and numbers that for the people of that time and culture would have understood it more clearly. We are the foreigners to the first century. If John had said his number is 1812, that would have meant one thing for an American and another thing for a Russian. For the American, he would immediately think of 1812 as the war between America and Great Britain, also known as the Second American Revolution. But when you're listening to Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture, the music is not describing the American Revolution of 1812.
It's describing when Russia defended itself successfully against the attack of Napoleon and his French army. The confusion of the meaning of a number occurs when we try to impose our 21st century American mindset onto a number whose symbolism derives its meaning from a first century Greco-Roman context. And when we try to do that, we get all kinds of confusion, which is exactly what the enemy wants. The number 666 is left many puzzled as to who or what it refers to, but it doesn't keep people from guessing and it doesn't keep people from applying some magical omen to the number itself as if the number takes on a life of its own outside of its context. Numbers that once had a significance based on the events attached to them somehow take on a mysterious and often superstitious meaning of their own in the distant future. And so the area code 666 does not exist. Jeopardy contestants are not allowed to wager $666 because the number has satanic associations in Christianity. And perhaps 2,000 years from now when America is perhaps long gone and the events related to 9-11 are long forgotten, the readiness of man's imagination to attach itself to fanciful superstitions will lead future generations to associate the number 9-11 with a tragic catastrophe. And as a result, to develop a tradition perhaps to refuse to leave their homes and to close places of business each year on that date without any knowledge of the original context of that number, but knowing that on that day a tragedy occurred and tragedy and death is somehow associated with that number for the same reason you will not usually find the number 13 on elevator number pads. This doesn't mean that you can't get a room on the 13th floor. It's just going to be called the 14th floor.
And that means the 14th floor is actually the 15th floor and the 15th floor is the 16th floor and all you're doing is potting one mistake on top of another because of a silly superstition. First of all, we want to understand the meaning of the verse in Revelation. We need to understand the purpose of the book of Revelation.
Otherwise, we're going to fall into that same trap where we just take a number and we apply some superstition to it, but we don't do that. As Christians, as believers, as people who are to apply wisdom and understanding, we are to go to the original context. And the context of this verse is in the book of Revelation. Revelation is not a book about hell's fury, but about heaven's glory and the church's victory over sin and death in Christ Jesus and his power to fulfill his promise to build his church and the gates of hell will not prevail against her. The book of Revelation, therefore, is all about Jesus. Jesus is revealing to John what is soon to take place in chapter 1. Jesus is addressing the seven churches in chapters 2 and 3. Jesus is on the throne receiving glory and honor and praise from all the angels and saints in heaven and earth in chapters 4 and 5. Jesus is breaking the seals in chapter 6.
Jesus is sealing his saints from every nation in chapter 7. Jesus is initiating and executing judgment through the blowing of the seven trumpets in chapters 8 and 9. Jesus is proclaiming his prophecy in a little scroll in chapter 10. Jesus is sending out his two witnesses in chapter 11. Jesus is conquering the dragon in chapter 12.
Jesus is exposing the number of the beast and the mystery of the beast in chapter 13. Jesus is standing with the 144,000 whom he has purchased with his blood in chapter 14. Jesus is receiving worship from the heavenly angels and beginning the final execution of his wrath against his enemies in chapters 15 and 16. Jesus is bringing judgment against the great prostitute, Babylon, in chapters 17 and 18. All of heaven is rejoicing in the victory of Jesus and his church at the marriage supper of the Lamb in chapter 19. Jesus oversees the final defeat of the devil and casts him and all who follow him into the lake of fire in chapter 20.
Jesus establishes a new heaven and a new earth where nothing unclean will ever enter in in chapter 21. His glorified saints are worshiping in the very presence of Jesus the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end in chapter 22. Many get caught up in the symbols of revelation and never see Jesus and that is why they're so confused and afraid. If they see Jesus, he's just a byproduct or side story. But it's Jesus who is bringing all of this about and bringing his church through it and sanctifying her, testing her, teaching her, holding her, and leading her all the way to glory. And it is Jesus who is revealing to his church the number 666. It is in this light that we're going to now look more closely at our passage.
So what do we make of this number 666? We are told in verse 13 that it requires wisdom and understanding, not imagination. The key words in this verse are wisdom and understanding. This requires letting the Scripture speak for itself and keeping it in the context of the time and the place in which it was written.
But why use all these symbols? Why not just say to the first century church who the beast is and what his name is? Well, for one thing John is in exile on the island of Patmos on account of the word of God and his testimony of Jesus.
If he starts identifying individuals in the first century as enemies of the church and these letters to the churches are intercepted or found in the hands of believers, Christian believers, they might be persecuted or even killed. Also, symbols and parables are a spiritual language intended for spiritual people, which requires wisdom and understanding, which, by the way, 1 Corinthians 2, 1 and 2 reminds us, belongs to the church, to those who are filled with the Spirit. It's as if Jesus turns to his church and begins to speak to them personally in a language that only they can understand.
Have you ever been in the presence of people who are speaking English and suddenly they start speaking some foreign language and you feel excluded? Well, that's what Jesus was doing as he spoke parables to his disciples. In Matthew 13 verse 10, the disciples came and said to him, Why do you speak to them in parables? And Jesus answered them, To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given. And so revelation is Jesus turning to his church, to his bride, and speaking a language to her that only she can understand. Revelation is an intimate and personal conversation of Jesus with his church.
And in order to understand what he's saying, it takes wisdom and understanding. And so he uses symbols to describe the second beast as having two horns like a lamb and speaks like a dragon and exercises all the authority of the first beast in its presence. In the mind of the first century believer, the first beast could represent the first century Rome government and the second beast could easily represent the apostate Jews who had rejected Jesus and used the Roman government to empower their movement against the church and against Christ Jesus.
The apostate Jews could not have crucified Jesus on their own. They depended upon the power of the Roman government, the sea beast, the first beast, to accomplish their wicked and evil plans. Verse 12 in chapter 13, it exercises all the authority of the first beast in its presence. And emperor worship was common in the first century.
Local authorities ascribed the status of deity to the emperor. And we read in chapter 13 verse 8, and all who dwell on the earth will worship it, speaking of the first beast, everyone whose name has not been written before the foundation of the world in the book of the lamb who was slain. We saw that pagan worship when the Jews cried out, we have no king but Caesar. And we heard the voice of the dragon coming out of their mouths when they cried out, crucify him. In Revelation 13, those who bear the mark of the beast on their foreheads and hands reflects the fact that their thoughts and actions are in submission to the beast.
Those who do not submit are restricted in their activities and society and culture, imprisoned and even killed. Christians who do not submit to the rampant idol worship and godless festivals in the first century Greco-Roman culture were made to pay a price even their own lives. And so Jesus is using symbols to help the church understand who the enemy is. We are told that the number of the beast is the number of a man. The Hebrew and Greek languages have no number systems, so it was common in the first century to use letters to represent numbers. So in Hebrew you've got aleph is one, beit is two, gimel is three.
In Greek you have alpha is one, beta is two, gamma is three, and so forth. So when John identifies the beast's number as 666, it is likely that that number represents the letters of the name of an individual. In the first century that number could refer to Nero, it could refer to Domitian who were emperors of Rome, or it could refer to man in the sense that it's a man-centered movement.
The short answer is we don't know for certain how the first century church interpreted this number, and we can only make educated guesses as to what or who the number 666 specifically refers to. Well then, what can we learn from this passage? Well, the first century churches addressed in the beginning of this letter are to apply wisdom and understanding to recognize the enemy, to calculate that number, and they are given the resources by the Spirit in that time to do so. The application of this text for the 21st century church is to apply the same wisdom and understanding to recognize the deceitfulness of the enemy today and to discern between good and evil, to seek the good and to reject the evil. Satan's power is in his ability to deceive you.
If he can't deceive you, he is a defeated enemy. God has given us his word, his truth as light in the darkness to expose the works of the devil so that his church might be able to defeat the devil by not being deceived but discerning the difference between good and evil. In Hebrews 5, the author says, For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the basic principles of the oracles of God.
You need milk, not solid food. For everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, since he is a child. But solid food, daily taking in God's word, is for the mature.
For those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil. It's something Adam should have done when he was standing next to Eve and the serpent was tempting her to take the fruit. He should have told that serpent to leave. It is what the second Adam did, Jesus, when Satan said to him, All these I will give to you if you will fall down and worship me. And Jesus said to him, Be gone, Satan, for it is written, You shall worship the Lord your God, and him only you shall serve. And when Peter took Jesus aside after Jesus announced his coming crucifixion and death, Peter began to rebuke him, saying, Far be it from you, Lord, this shall never happen to you.
But Jesus turned and said to Peter, Get behind me, Satan. You are a hindrance to me, for you are not setting your mind on the things of God but on the things of man. If we are to have the wisdom and understanding to be able to do that, we must know who God is. We must know his word. This wisdom and understanding to discern between good and evil is one of the most important qualifications of an elder. In Titus chapter one, he must hold firm to the trustworthy word as taught so that he may be able to give instruction and sound doctrine and also to rebuke those who contradict it.
It was the prayer of Paul for the church in Philippi when he said, My prayer is that your love may abound more and more with knowledge and all discernment so that you may approve what is excellent and so be pure and blameless for the day of Christ filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ to the glory and praise of God. So this week, if someone asks you, What did your pastor preach on last Sunday? You can say, Well he preached on the meaning of the number 666.
Oh really? What does it mean? And you can say, It means that Jesus knows who the enemy is. Jesus has Satan's number. And if I am to be safe from the enemy, I must know Jesus and love him and worship him for he has defeated Satan on the cross. And I am to have that discernment between good and evil by reading his word daily and seeking that wisdom and understanding that can only come as the Holy Spirit teaches me through his word. We know who he is and we are aware of the devil's schemes and we are more than conquerors through Christ who loved us because the book of Revelation is about the victory of Christ Jesus and his church over Satan and the church is called to go into the world and preach the gospel, the gospel of the cross of Christ with the divine message of hope and forgiveness.
If you learn the magician's tricks, the lure and wonder in all of his magic is removed and that's why magicians never reveal their secrets otherwise they are out of a job. Satan is out of a job when Jesus appears and gives that wisdom and understanding to his church to recognize the deceitful schemes of the devil and to respond appropriately with the gospel that is the power of God unto salvation to all who believe. That is a lamp unto our feet and a light unto our path the psalmist says in Psalm 119. We fight as soldiers of Christ against sin, against the devil and the rulers of the world of this darkness against the spirits of wickedness in the high places and we go into the world, into this dark world with the sword of the Word of God to defeat the enemy who is holding men and women bondage and making disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit and teaching them to observe all that Jesus has commanded. And through that gospel, the preaching of the gospel, those who are in bondage are released and freed. Those who are in darkness are brought into the light out of the power of Satan to the power of God and Jesus himself is with the church even to the end of the age. That's what the number 666 means. It is a symbol that stands for the defeat of the enemy and the victory of Christ and his church.
It is not a number to fear as Satan wants to use it as but exposes the identity of evil and equips the church to confront that evil with the gospel. In fact, the Bible, when it was written, did not have chapter divisions. So as we read chapter 13 verse 18, look at what the next verses say. Then I looked and behold on Mount Zion stood the Lamb and with Him 144,000 who had His name and His Father's name written on their foreheads. And I heard a voice from heaven like the roar of many waters and like the sound of loud thunder.
The voice I heard was like the sound of harpists playing on their harps and they were singing a new song before the throne and before the four living creatures and before the elders. No one could learn that song except the 144,000 who had been redeemed from the earth. It is these who have not defiled themselves with women for they are virgins. It is these who follow the Lamb wherever He goes. These have been redeemed from mankind as first fruits for God and the Lamb.
And in their mouth no lie was found for they are blameless. That's who the church is called to be, blameless before the Lord as we follow Him. And in the midst of this war against sin, the church celebrates the Lord's Supper which proclaims the death of Jesus until He comes. And each Sunday we celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ on the first day of the week. So as believers we sing, we pray, we fellowship, we worship, we preach, we teach, and we celebrate Jesus on the battlefield in the midst of the war. And in doing so we bear constant testimony to the world that in joy and in sorrow, in times of peace and times of war and tribulation, Jesus is the Lamb of God who stands in heaven as having been slain, who is worthy of our praise and honor and worship because He has defeated the devil.
And He has empowered the church to go out with the gospel message that is powerful into salvation to all who believe. And in fact the last chapter of Revelation ends with a promise, a response, and a benediction. In Revelation chapter 22 verse 20 we read the promise. He who testifies to these things says, Surely I am coming soon.
And then we read the response. Amen. Come Lord Jesus. And then it closes with a benediction. The grace of the Lord Jesus be with all. Amen.
Let's pray. Lord God I thank you for the book of Revelation that this is a revelation of Jesus Christ to His church to equip her to fight the battle, a battle that Christ has already won for us on the cross and from His resurrection from the dead. We are fighting a defeated enemy. We know that in Christ Jesus we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. Oh Lord help us as a church to be faithful to keep our eyes fixed on Jesus. Not to be deceived by the devil who seeks to make this book of Revelation all about Him and all about His secrets so that we don't want to read it. But now that we know that every chapter in the book of Revelation is about Jesus and about His revelation to His church to stand firm, to hold fast, to not be lukewarm, to keep our eyes fixed on Him. Lord help us to do that as we go to your Word daily, studying your Word, meditating on your Word day and night. And help us to be faithful to proclaim the Gospel that is your power unto salvation to all who believe. And may we do so to the glory of God. And I pray in Jesus' name. Amen.
