666, Part 2

Well in light of our deceived world, in light of so many false teachers distorting the gospel, in light of moral values and absolutes that are being washed down the sewer, the good news is the mission of the body of Christ is not a puzzle.

It hasn't changed. We're going to go and make disciples, baptize them, identify them publicly through water, teach them to observe all I've commanded you Jesus Christ said and then he said and by the way I am with you always even to the end of this age. One of the reasons why our commitment to making disciples is so important is because a day is coming when those who reject Christ will face his wrath. The prophecies in the Bible regarding the end times are real and will happen. When you think of the end time prophecies the number 666 is important but what does it mean and what does it stand for? How will it be used in the Great Tribulation? We're going to see what God's Word says today.

This is Wisdom for the Heart with Stephen Davey. Stephen is the pastor of Colonial Baptist Church in Cary, North Carolina. Today he's wrapping up a series on the end times called Antichrist and the Many Faces of Evil.

Here's Stephen. Friends, if there was ever a day when the world is primed for somebody to deceive it into believing a lie, if there was ever a generation ready to embrace something, some kind of anchor, whether it be a new world religion, a global economy, it's our generation today. Now thus far in our study in chapter 13 we've seen the false priest, preacher performing signs and wonders, that's verses 12 and 13 if you are with us.

The next few verses reveal him setting up a statue and giving it life miraculously, thus further deceiving people. The world will now flock to Jerusalem to worship the image as the Jews scatter and run for their lives. Now the world is primed and ready for the next step of global deception.

Let me break it down into three parts if you're taking notes. Number one, three aspects here of this last conquering, so to speak, of the world. Number one is the global physical surrender to the Antichrist.

Global physical surrender. Look at verse 16 where we left off in our last study. And he causes all, the small and the great, the rich and the poor, the free men and the slaves to be given a mark on their right hand or on their forehead. Now you've heard of the mark of the beast, haven't you?

Well this is the origin of that terminology. It's true, it will happen. And I want you to notice first off, there's a lot of things we're going to see, but I want you to notice first off the global sweep of this decree. John in verse 16 refers to the small and the great. That's every social category, the untouchables in India to the royal family in England.

This is going to hit everybody. John adds the rich and the poor. This is every economic category on the planet. This is the poorest of the poor. This is the poor person. This is from that kind of poverty all the way to the billionaire on Wall Street.

Or I should say the former billionaire on Wall Street. The Antichrist doesn't care if you're rich or poor, well-bred or disowned. He wants your worship. John adds in that last phrase the free men and the slaves. This is every cultural category. So you have every social category, every economic category, and every cultural category. Basically what he's saying is everybody.

This is a long way of basically saying there's no loophole, nobody gets out, everybody's going to be given this decree. Every human being except those who believe in Christ after the rapture are going to receive this mark on their body. Now you might notice back in that verse again that this is given to them either on their right hand or their forehead. Now in the Bible, and again the Antichrist is mimicking the Bible, the right hand is the symbol of strength and the forehead is the most conspicuous part of the body.

For some of us it's even more conspicuous than others. Now in Revelation 7 we read about God marking the forehead of his 144,000 evangelists. You remember they were from the tribes of Israel. They were marked and they couldn't die. The Antichrist couldn't kill them.

So now this copycat is at it again. He's going to mark his servants just as God marked his. And he's going to put a mark on their forehead.

He's going to be given an option either the right hand representing their authority or strength or their forehead. Now the word mark, kiragma, was immediately understood by John's audience, not so much by us so let me slow down for a minute and tell you what's happening. In the Roman Empire slaves were given a kiragma, sometimes a stigma, we get that word that we use now even to this day. They were branded. It proved that they were the property of that particular estate.

In fact that carried all the way through. It's still being done in many countries today. It was done in our own country until the slaves were emancipated, branded to show they belonged to the estate.

Horrible practice. Soldiers would often voluntarily brand themselves with the name of their general as a statement of loyalty, as a statement that we are willing to die for this man and this man's cause. There are several other illustrations.

I'll just give you one more. In the world of commercial enterprise every contract of commercial enterprise was stamped with the name of the emperor and the current date. This indicated, this declared that that commercial activity upheld the name and the authority of the emperor.

So John's readers got it immediately. The Antichrist is placing his mark on his slaves. They are his property. Furthermore, his slaves are marked with his name to declare that they are willing to give their lives for him. They're loyal to him. And even further still they're saying that listen, nothing is going to happen commercially.

Our whole lives, our hopes, our dreams are bound up to uphold the name of our emperor. Now let's some think that this future mark of the beast is a chip placed under the skin. You go back to your text and you notice the Bible uses very clear terminology translated well in your Bible to inform us that this mark will be on, upon the right hand or the forehead. It's clearly intended to be visible.

It's intended to be seen, obvious. Now let me add this, lest anybody thinks that everybody on the planet is forced into doing this, the decree is there certainly, and if you don't, you know it's bad news, but I want you to know the Greek language presents a very different picture here of those who receive it. It's not like there's a gun to their head and if they don't get it they're dead. The language indicates that they are rushing to get it. They want to get it. They want to have it. They long to have it. They willingly give up that right hand or the forehead. Please give me the name of my emperor.

That's the language here. This is going to be a great day for the world. They think it's the pinnacle of their sovereign emperor.

Of course I'll bear his name. They'll press forward to receive it at their places of worship. They're going to be thrilled. They're going to bear the mark of their emperor like a soldier wears his medals of honor.

They're going to bear like a professional athlete, even down a little league wears their jersey with great pride. This is the pride of a patriot who carries the flag of his country. They're going to want the rest of the world to know I follow him. I belong to him. I uphold his name. Everything about my life, every commercial activity is to honor him.

Here, please give me the mark. Can you imagine? What they don't realize is that they've been deceived. The dragon through the antichrist and his minister of propaganda has done nothing less than turn the world into a global concentration camp, and now all of the inmates are numbered.

And in less than 36 months, most of them will be dead. Now obviously, Satan wants people to bear the name of his false messiah, and he's going to be all excited about that. He's going to get worship, but he really has something else behind that that he's after, isn't he?

Doesn't he have something? It's to flush out the remaining believers so he can kill them. This is the motive.

This is the main issue behind what seems to be the main issue. So this is not only going to involve a global physical surrender to the antichrist, but the second aspect is this is a global economic stranglehold by the antichrist. Look at verse 17. The text tells us, and he provides that no one will be able to buy or to sell except the one who has the mark, either the name of the beast or the number of his name.

And we're going to talk in a minute about what it means, the number of his name. But for now, notice the antichrist is going to shut down any financial activity by those who are not proud citizens of the new world order. I mean, if you're not loyal to the emperor, if you're not really fitting into this scene, if you're not a loyal patriot, you have no right to benefit from it. You don't belong in it. So we're going to see you starve. You can't buy anything, whether it's buying food or buying medicine or putting gas into your car, you're stuck and you have nowhere to hide.

Now, how's he going to pull this off? Well, we don't know. And every generation probably had to struggle through it as expositors got up and explained the text. I think for us, it's not as much of a stretch as it was for preachers. I heard even 30 and 40 years ago in times past, one author said the idea of a mark that would individually identify everybody in the world for governmental control seemed a far fetched fantasy possible only in science fiction. But no one today, however, questions the possibility of such an identification process. Is anybody here doubt that it could happen?

Not at all. It's possible that everyone who receives the mark will be given some of the latest technology that has already been in the market for some time that identifies them. And not only that, it tracks them. Several authors I've researched pointed out the latest in personal identification systems. One caught my eye. It talked about the first human test of a small microchip. In fact, this is back in 2002, the size of a grain of rice implanted underneath the skin that tracks these people. Business Week Online referred to the developments of Digital Angel technology.

I thought it was interesting. It was called Digital Angel. At any rate, it represents the first ever combination of advanced sensors, web-enabled wireless telecommunications linked to global positioning systems. By using advanced sensor capabilities, Digital Angel is able to monitor ambient temperature and physical movement. For those who have the chip and they're giving these to Alzheimer's patients, they're putting it on cattle, has wonderful benefits of protection and safety. It saves from theft. So it has wonderful benefits. But it's going to integrate biosensors and via sensors, whatever they are, wireless communications and GPS technology. It'll be able to read your heart rate, your temperature, your blood pressure, your pulse and blood chemistry.

Because this technology is networked with the Internet and the GPS systems, your information can be sent instantly to your doctor from wherever you are on the planet. Now, listen, listen, these chips are not the mark of the beast. If it comes out tomorrow and you want to put it on your dog so that if it strays, that doesn't mean you've given your dog to the Antichrist. He may belong to him already.

I don't know. Your bird, definitely. Go ahead and put it in there. That thing's lost. But you can track it.

You can decide whether to go get it because that's fine. You haven't come, you haven't given over to the Antichrist. That's not it at all. The mark of the beast is not your social security number. It's not some national ID number or any other number. The mark of the beast is his number. It's his name. And there will come a time when people will decide, will they take his name? It's not like some kind of secret. If you get that chip, maybe I've been tricked and now I belong to the Antichrist.

That's not it at all. And remember, by the way, this is going to be inaugurated after we're where? In heaven. And even for those who've accepted Christ living through the tribulation, it's not going to be some sleight of hand where the next thing you know, they've gotten some kind of tattoo or some kind of chip and now they belong to the Antichrist and they really didn't want to belong to him. They belong to Christ. That isn't going to happen. It's going to be a conscious decision.

And these people, the world with great joy, will take his name. One more comment about this tracking system that perhaps the Antichrist might use to flush people out who don't go along with his system or have received his name in some way. They're now developing radio frequency identification tags going on or in almost everything made. Retailers are now using these. It helps against theft, shoplifting. In fact, I was reading this past week about grocery carts that are being designed that will automatically scan items you put in there. So you put in your gallon of milk and it'll scan the price. You put in your box of chocolate covered donuts and it'll honk at you until you take them out. See, that's my nightmare. That's what I'm afraid it'll do.

Toes it all up. There may come a day when you just swipe your cart across your grocery cart, you go on out to your car. And it'd be wonderful technology. Again, it's not the mark of the beast. It's only technology that will allow, I believe, the beast to track everybody and do what we here see.

Shutting down economy. Any kind of purchasing for those who do not have his name. RFID systems, radio frequency identification systems. It's interesting now they've designed ink that carries the ability electronically to read or it has embedded in the ink the tracking system, which has even further implications.

So if you had his name, perhaps that name could have embedded in it all that was necessary to track you in his very ink. Well, what will all this technology do one day? Well, in the new world order, it will enable one man to virtually control commerce. Put a stranglehold on commerce and only those John 13 verse 17 says only those who have given their loyalty and allegiance to him will be able to buy or sell. So we have a global physical surrender to the Antichrist. We have a global economic stranglehold in these days by the Antichrist.

One more. We have global spiritual supremacy of the Antichrist. Look at verse 18. Verse 18 reads, here is wisdom. Let him who has understanding calculate the number of the beast for the number is that of a man and his number is 666 666.

Just the sound of it makes you think of the devil doesn't it? 666 it even hisses like the serpent. In the Bible, numbers can be both figurative and literal at the same time. We think of the number three that way. It's a number that represents our triune God. The number seven is a number in the scriptures that represents perfection, perhaps completeness. The number one represents unity.

I read a text earlier where one body there's one Lord represents unique singularity and unity. Number six represents man. We're told here represents it's the number of a man.

Man was created on the sixth day. The triple designation of the number six I think does have figurative meaning. It figuratively indicates the Antichrist's attempt at mimicking the triune God. 666 he is the triune false God. He is the triune man. He claims to be God, but he's just a goat. He would like to be 777 triple perfection, but he is only 666.

He is simply a man failing three times over. Some suggested that's all the number means. It's just figurative. I believe it's also a literal designation the way John talks about having insight in order to calculate the number. He's saying add it up. I think there's a literal designation here.

The total sum of his name is 666. Let me explain. This is what many evangelical Bible scholars believe to be the one clear example of gematria in the Bible. The Greek word geomatria or geomatria gives us our transliterated word what? My favorite subject. It wasn't my favorite subject, but you're right. It's geometry. The practice of gematria attracts all the way back to John and centuries before the Hebrew letters, Greek letters, Latin letters were all given numerical values. By using certain letters, then you could also represent a certain numerical figure.

By the way, this is one of the reasons people thought Hitler was the Antichrist. H had a numerical value. I has a numerical value. T has a numerical value, at least in the English language. It all totaled up to 666.

When you added up the numerical attributes of those letters, you got the sum of 666. The trouble is here in this text we're not told what language to calculate in. Is it Hebrew? Is it Latin? Is it Greek? Is it German? Is it Italian? Is it French?

We're not told which language it is. Even still and further confusing is the fact that you can have all sorts of combinations of letters to get to the sum of 666. Let me illustrate it for you this way. If we give a numerical value to certain letters, let's just do this as an illustration.

If A equals one, B equals two, C equals... I want to make sure you're awake here. This is exciting.

I know this is thrilling for you to come to church to get this. D equals and so forth. Now we want to get to the sum total using letters of six. We could use two As and one D and we'd have six. We could however use one C, one B, and one A and get six. We could also use two Cs.

Reminds me of my report card growing up. And we'd get six. All the combinations just to get to a single six. Imagine how many combinations you could have to get to 666. geometry was discovered by archaeologists in Pompeii, interestingly enough. One man had written on the wall, I love her, whose number is 545. That wasn't her phone number. Basically, what he was saying is her letters add up to that. He both concealed her identity to those who didn't know her and revealed her identity to those who did.

That's sort of what you have happening here. Here's the challenge. Since many different letters can equal 666, it's impossible to figure the name out in advance. It's a puzzle. It's a puzzle from our creative God. And some of you aren't going to be able to sleep tonight because there's a puzzle in the Bible that you can't figure out. It'll be figured out in the tribulation, which means you don't want to figure it out, right? You don't want to be part of the group that figures it out who has insight. So don't try to guess now.

Come across all sorts of guesses. Henry Kissinger added up to 666. So did John F. Kennedy. So did Lyndon Johnson. So did Ronald Reagan. In fact, they came across one author who said that Bill Gates III, those numerical values, those letters, equals 666. And so does Windows 95. And you're probably thinking, that explains it.

I knew the devil was in my computer. Now don't waste your imagination on the puzzle. It's going to give confirmation to those who are living through it that this one is indeed the false messiah. That's one puzzle we won't be around to solve. So what does the church do in the meantime? Well, we like the Thessalonians wait for the upward call of Christ. Well, in light of our deceived world, in light of so many false teachers distorting the gospel, in light of moral values and absolutes that are being washed down the sewer, the good news is the mission of the body of Christ is not a puzzle. It hasn't changed.

It's been the same since its inception of the first century. We're to go and make disciples, bring along followers of Christ, the true messiah, baptize them, identify them publicly through water, teach them to observe all I've commanded you, Jesus Christ said. And then he said, and by the way, I am with you always, even to the end of this age and the upward call. Here's our mission. I think best spoken by one search and rescue team in Colorado, they put it this way. And I quote, millions of people visit the mountains of Larimer County, Colorado, every year a few will become lost, stranded, injured, and some will die. Our objective is to find and rescue these lost or injured people before it's too late.

We are dedicated to saving lives. Wouldn't it be great if the church had that as its motto? Not, we don't know what the word save means anymore.

No, here's what it means. Be saved from the wrath of God. Be saved by the savior who can deliver you from sin and judgment and save you unto himself forever. And we ought to be reveling in the glory and grace of God has revealed that truth to us, opened our eyes and we today worship him our great savior. As we study a topic like this one on the end times, the big picture idea is that in the end, God always wins. It's important that we be on the winning side of the grand plan that God is unfolding in history.

Aren't you grateful for the salvation God offered through Jesus Christ? This is Wisdom for the Heart with Stephen Davey. The lesson you heard today is called 666 and it's the final lesson in Stephen's series entitled Antichrist and the Many Faces of Evil. Since we've reached the end of this series, I want to remind you of a resource that we have for each of our teaching series.

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Write to us at Wisdom for the Heart, P.O. Box 37297, Raleigh, North Carolina, 27627. Our address once again is Wisdom for the Heart, P.O. Box 37297, Raleigh, North Carolina, 27627. Thanks for listening today. When we come back tomorrow, Stephen will begin a series from Paul's letter to the Philippians. Join us here on Wisdom for the Heart.