WHAT IS THE MARK OF THE BEAST?

Sermonette, Eric V. Snow, Ann Arbor, MI UCG 04-29-06

What is the mark of the Beast? How does the Bible support our traditional teaching about it? If challenged, could you really prove it concerns the Sunday Sabbath?

Mass mailing of SDA book, National Sunday Law, to condo building I live in. Frustrating to read, since closer to truth than traditional Protestant evangelicals like Lindsey, Van Impe, since deny the rapture, yet still often wrong. Mix up on two Beasts, think 10 horns simultaneous not successive. Yet say that the mark of the Beast concerns Sunday observance.

S.P.S. By comparing texts about the sign of God with those about the mark of the Beast, we can know that this dreaded mark concerns disobedience to God’s commandments. Since the Fourth commandment is the most controversial and the most commonly ignored or reinterpreted even by professing Christians, deception will occur about it most easily. Which commandment could Satan trick people on most easily? Especially if secular in outlook, using natural law reasoning, see no difference intrinsically between one day and another.

Example: calendars that put Monday first, Sunday last, like my company’s time sheets for reporting hours worked. Sunday then the 7^th day of week, right?

Revelation 13:11-18, esp. 16+

Iron Maiden song, quoted.

Papacy, not the USA, as SDA’s teach. First Beast is Rome, not the Church. The woman, Catholic church, can’t be the first Beast and yet ride it also, as HWA observed.

Verses 16-18: Consider what commandment interferes with buying, selling, keeping a job. Notice that the MARK is on the forehead and right hand. Don’t worry about implanted computer chips, Social Security card numbers, a computer in Brussels (EU’s HQ) named “Beast,” etc. Mere distractions, red herrings.

Verse 18: Hebrew and Greek like Latin, uses letters as numbers, like V for 5 and X for 10. When use Biblical language of Greek and its word for Romans, “Lateinos,” works out to 666. Mistaken to use title of Pope in Latin meaning “Vicar of the Son of God,” although perhaps not a coincidence. Hebrew spelling of “Nero Caesar” and Hebrew word for Romulus, legendary founder of Rome, works out to 666 also.

Use Bible to interpret its symbols. Don’t read own ideas into its symbols.

Exodus 31:13-17

Sabbath as a sign, a covenant, not said here to be part of the old covenant, but has separate authority. Satan’s system has a mark. Correspondingly, God’s way has a sign that rivals it, will triumph over it.

Deut. 6:1-8

V. 8: Notice the commandments are to be on one’s hand, the center of work/doing, and the front of one’s head, the center of thought/thinking. So if accept the mark of the Beast, people are more loyal to Satan than to God. Suffer fearsome punishments then from God’s wrath.

Conclusion: If we know what the mark of the Beast is, we can much more easily avoid it. So then, suppose in our lifetimes mandatory Sunday observance/“Blue” laws are imposed in America. This could occur domestically because traditional Catholics and Protestants want such laws. Or maybe a dictatorial European Union would have economic and/or political control over us and then insist on Sunday rest for all workers. Suppose the FBI, the state troopers, or the local cops show up to arrest Christian Sabbath keepers who dare to criticize such laws. Suppose we can only get a job or run a business by saying we’ll observe Sunday. Will we choose to die rather than accept the mark of the Beast? Will we uphold the sign of God? Will we reject the mark of the Beast? The choice will be yours!