Oh, you know what? I forgot the microphone. Scream. Be like a good Baptist preacher. Oh, I hope that's not on there, what I just said. So I'm going to turn these on. I know if you're watching the live stream, you can hear me, but you're not going to hear me that well when I start standing over there. So let me get this plugged in. I should have thought of that beforehand. And oops on me. So let me. Let me plug this in. I knew I was forgetting something. Anyway, welcome to the live stream portion of the Household of Faith in Christ weekly gathering. I encourage you to learn more about us online. If you're curious at householdoffaithinchrist.com, there you'll find links to all of our sermons. We're in the middle of our sermon series on Revelation, but we've got other sermons on other parts of the Bible there as well. And does somebody want a really quick pull up who has Facebook and just make sure the audio is working? Normally, Dina does that, but she had to duck out. But assuming you can hear me, you can link to all the sermons, like I said, our statement of faith, links to trusted resources that have been vetted by the church. You can learn more about us and the churches we're connected with. You can reach out with a request for prayer, or if you have a theological question that you'd like answered, or if you're looking for a church and you wanna see if we could be a fit, you can reach out and we can have a conversation and see if we might be a place for you to visit and see if we could become your home church, all that sort of stuff. You can connect to the radio show that I've been doing for a while now called The Faith Debate. All that's on our website, householdoffaithinchrist.com. And I'm looking to make sure we've got audio. I'm assuming we do. Does anybody know for sure? Can you find me? The video is going, but I'm having trouble getting it to catch up. Oh. Well, I wonder if that's because there isn't the audio. I usually plug in the microphones before I start it, so I just want to make sure that me plugging it in after hasn't screwed it up. Wow. Well, it depends. If you're my banker, Elon Musk. Do we have audio? I'm having a hard time getting it to load. Okay. Well, you want to get your Bibles ready? We're going to be beginning to look at Revelation chapter 13 today. We have it. I heard something. Was that us? Okay, there we go, that's us. All right, we have audio, I just wanted to make sure. So Revelation 13 is where we're gonna be looking today. We're about, we got what, 10 chapters to go in our series on Revelation. This one I've titled Beast of the Sea. So it was about 10 years ago when our family took a vacation to the beach. In our family vacations, they have always been filled with lots of crazy mishaps, often therefore heightened with levels of stress. And this vacation, it was no different. And one of the highlights, or should I say lowlights, of this particular trip happened on the very first day. And given our past challenges to experience a fun-filled laissez-faire time away from home, we decided it would be a really good idea for us to do all that we could to start off on the right foot. It's not all the right notes at the very beginning. So before we even checked in at the hotel, as soon as we arrived, enter the city limits of the, the Oceanside city that we were going to, we headed straight to the beach and we set up our little towel in the sand and Dina played with Tyler, kept watch over our stuff while our daughter and I, we jogged straight for the water and it was a sunny day and Waves were rolling in, and the seagulls, they were making a joyful noise, and the breeze, it felt just right. And we waded out into the salty sea, up to our waists, and it felt good. We got off to a very nice start to the family getaway. My daughter, Danny, and I, we were talking out in the water about how comfortable the water was. The temperature was perfect. And we were thinking about later on, we'd go get some seashells. And we were wondering if maybe we should have applied a little more sunscreen, or at least I was, because I could already feel the sun rays beginning to cook my skin. And we had only been out in the water for less than five minutes. And then it happened. Out of nowhere, a large sea swell swept us up slightly off our feet. And if you've ever been out in the ocean, you might know this experience where the water lifts you. And it's all I can do to keep your head bobbing above the water until you settle back down and you can feel the sand beneath your feet. So I thought, wow, that water rose fast from my hips all the way over my head, like in no time flat. So I think I better move on in closer to the shore. And as I was thinking this, another wave, much larger than that wave that just passed seconds before, it came crashing toward me. And I spun away from the watery horizon to try to protect myself from its impact. And it kind of worked, except the wall of water, it rushed over my entire body. And as it did so, it pulled my glasses from my face. Now I know what you're thinking. Yes, I was wearing my glasses in the ocean. A little voice had told me I should take them off, but I had no intention of getting my head wet. We were just going to wade through the water. That's it. Just for a little while. And then we're going to go to the hotel. We're going to check in. Then we go back to the beach. And then I'd take my glass off because we'd go, you know, full head on into the water. That was the plan. Well, I should have known better. I should have been better at recalling my Bible study. Because the vast sea is an unpredictable and powerful thing. And it is often depicted as a symbol of chaos, which brings calamity in scripture. And so I should have taken better care. But I didn't. So my glasses flew from my face. Now, I did try sweeping my hands really quickly through the water. And actually, for half a second, I felt like I hit them, maybe even once or twice. Tried to catch them, but the odds were stacked against me. I could not pull them from the roiling salt water, and so there was no hope. They were gone. And this was the first day of our vacation. The first minutes, really. And I gotta tell you, I really, truly, I do not see well without my glasses. I need my glasses. So this was not good. My daughter and I, we spent hours going up and down the shoreline, hoping that we would see my glasses get pushed up onto the sand from the incoming waves. We gave up the search momentarily. We drove to the hotel. We didn't want to lose our room, so we went to the hotel to check in. But then we returned back to the scene of the crime, where the Atlantic Ocean had stolen my glasses. And we looked again, but nothing. And then suddenly my daughter thought she spotted them. I'm tempted to say we thought we spotted them, but really she's the one who could see without her glasses. And she said, hey, are these yours? And I was so excited. And I ran over to where she was and I looked at the glasses in her hand and I realized they were not mine. Someone else had apparently had their glasses stolen by the waves too. But I figured what the heck, so I tried them on. And they were very beat up. The frames were all bent, kind of mangled. The frames were very scratched up by the sand, I guess. But surprisingly, the prescription for these glasses was kind of, sorta in the ballpark of my prescription. And so, with no other options available for the next week and a half, these were the glasses I wore for the rest of the trip. And they gave me a massive headache. Because nothing really looked clear. I mean, some of the things in front of me were clearer than they might have been if I was wearing no glasses at all. But everything was distorted. Not really unlike what you'd find at one of those funny mirrors in the House of Horrors, you know what I mean? Where it's clear, but not really clear. Everything's distorted. So I share all this with you because there's a moral to the story. And the moral of the story is respect the sea. It is bigger than you think. It is more dangerously unpredictable than you think. And if you're not careful, it will keep you from seeing things as they truly are. The C might make it so that you do not have eyes to see if you do not have ears to hear. So listen to the voice warning you. Heed these words from Revelation chapter 13. And I saw a beast rising out of the sea with 10 horns and seven heads, with 10 diadems on its horns and blasphemous names on its heads. This verse is Theanostas. It is God-breathed. This is the Word of God. It's what we call, in our common vernacular, inspired. Because it's inspired, it's without error. It is infallible. It is a fully sufficient rule and guide for our faith and our life practice. And we need to always remember that. Heed its Word. And in this case, it's a Word that's telling us to respect. The sea. Next week, Lord willing, we're gonna turn our attention to the following verses in this chapter, and we're gonna spend some time comparing what John describes about the beast here with what Daniel describes in the Old Testament about the beast that's depicted there. Today, though, we are going to begin our trek through tackling these verses in chapter 13 one at a time by beginning and ending today with verse one. If you recall our last sermon, those who were here last week, some of our English Bibles, they have different versification for this part of the book. There is a line about standing on the sand of the sea. And some translators have placed that line at the end of chapter 12 and others have placed it at the start of chapter 13. I want us to keep in mind what we talked about last week, that these chapter divisions, the verse numbers, these are not part of the original text. They would not become part of anyone's Bible for hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of years. So the Revelation was just one big, long epistle when it was written. This is actually why I've mentioned before that it's a pretty good idea, at least one time in your life, I encourage you to open up the book of Revelation, start with chapter one, verse one, and read it all the way through to the end in one sitting. Because that's how we read letters, typically. You start and end a letter in one sitting, so I would encourage you to do that at least once. Now, we're not doing that in our sermon series because of all of the confusion and conflation and issues that are surrounding the Book of Revelation. We're going slow to address all of those sorts of things, but when you're reading it, try reading the whole thing all the way through. Anyway, toward the end of our previous sermon, we dealt with this line about standing on the sand of the sea. We already dealt with that. So today, we're going to follow after the chapter division that we find in the English Standard Version. That's the version I've read from today. Again, to remind us, here's what verse one says. And I saw a beast rising out of the sea with ten horns and seven heads, with ten diadems on its horns and blasphemous names on its heads. So John reports to us that he saw a beast, a dangerous, evil monster, a vicious, killing animal, a hostile, wild tyrant. We should call to mind images that we find in 2 Kings 2, verse 24. He cursed them in the name of the Lord, and two she-bears, two beasts, came out of the woods and tore 42 of the boys. We should call to mind images from Ezekiel chapter 14. I cause wild beasts to pass through the land and they ravage it. And it will be made desolate so that no one may pass through because of the beasts. For thus says the Lord God, I stand upon Jerusalem, send upon Jerusalem my four disastrous acts of judgment, sword, famine, wild beasts and pestilence. We should call to mind images from Hosea chapter 13. So I am to them like a lion, like a leopard I will lurk beside the way. I will fall upon them like a bear robbed of her cubs. I will tear open their breast and there I will devour them like a lion as a wild beast would rip them open. In Jeremiah chapter four, verse seven, a lion has gone up from his thicket. A destroyer of nations has set out. He has gone out from his place to make your land a waste. Your cities will be ruins without inhabitants. This is what we should be picturing when hearing of the beast. Our imagination should be set ablaze. Our knees should wobble. Our hearts should race. We should hear the pounding, the thump of our pulse in our ears. If you can't paint a vivid picture of imposing scariness in your mind when you're reading the revelation, then you should most definitely take steps to limit your screen time because those glowing screens are sucking the life out of your brain. The beast of verse 1 is rising from the sea. It's like a Van Gogh depiction of persecuting powers rising up from the abyss. The pit that is the haunt of demons. It's a sort of hell. Whereas it says in Isaiah 57, the wicked are like the tossing sea, which cannot rest, whose waves cast up mire and mud. There is no peace, says my God, for the wicked. This horrible beast has 10 horns. This is a symbol of total human military might. Think of all the powerful horned animals we see out in the wild. They use their horns for both aggressive attack and also as a very effective defense. This beast is an imposing political power. And the beast is intelligent, as indicated by having seven heads. It's able to exercise dominion in ruling over its muscle-bound body. With the 10 diadems, these are a kind of crown illustrating the beast's regal influence over a sort of Confederate kingdom. And these are not the victory wreath kind of crowns we see elsewhere in scripture. The diadems, they denote ruling sovereignty over the beast's affairs on Earth, but not victory. This is a very important note for us to always keep in mind. The beast does not win. It is God who wins. And the beast is fighting against God, as indicated by the blasphemous names on its seven heads. Now some like to make the point that these seven heads, they point to seven very specific dominant world powers in human history. And the first six typically are listed as Egypt, Assyria, Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece, and Rome. And then the seventh kingdom is then often said to be the final kingdom of Antichrist. It's interesting to note that the word Antichrist actually appears nowhere in the Revelation. But John does use the term quite a bit elsewhere in the New Testament, and thematically it's certainly appropriate to think in terms of Antichrist here. I mean, after all, the blasphemous names, they indicate taking names that are reserved for God. The beast is hoping to usurp Christ. Well, that's not pro-Christ. That's anti-Christ. Now there's some question as to whether the English here should read blasphemous name or blasphemous names. Now, whether it's supposed to be singular or plural could affect if a person tends to think of the beast as an individual antichrist person or a collective antichrist system. Seeing an individual as antichrist, it has merit from a biblical point of view, but the emphasis here in Revelation 13, it's almost definitely on a system. Now which one should we prefer? The plural or the singular? The system or the individual? I say both. Because whether it's an individual or it's a combination of individuals heading up a corrupt system, we are to understand that we are up against a formidable foe. One of power and intelligence and influence So we need to depend on the Lord's strength and the Word's wisdom and the Spirit's illumination. Let me pause for a second and ask you, how are you feeling about all of this? How are you feeling about life of late? We face the beast on a daily basis. We're Rocky Balboa up against the power of Mr. T's Clubber Lang. We're the Italian Stallion outmatched against the bright and well schooled Apollo Creed. We're the rock in a foreign land facing off not only against Drago, but also against the influence of a communist system that backed him. But remember what Sylvester Stallone, the actor who portrays the beloved fictional boxer, what he says to his son in one of Hollywood's all-time great inspirational speeches. His son asks him if he's nervous about the fight. Let me ask you, are you nervous about the fight? Rocky was. Rocky says that he's scared to death. So his son tells him he doesn't have to do it. You have someone whispering to you that you don't have to enter the ring of spiritual warfare. That's essentially what Rocky's son is saying to his dad in Rocky 6, also known as Rocky Balboa. Be easier that way. Easier on Rocky, easier on his son. That's the point his son is making. Because you see, his son was weary from the fight. Weary. Weary from the fight of living in a sinful world. His son had basically given up. Given up the fight of doing what's right. Giving up the fight to commit himself to excellence. Here's what his son heard from his father in response. People stick a finger in your face and tell you you're no good. When things got hard, you start looking for something to blame. Let me tell you something you already know. The world ain't all sunshine and rainbows. It's a very mean and nasty place. And I don't care how tough you are, it will beat you to your knees and keep you there permanently if you let it. You, me, or nobody is going to hit as hard as life. But it ain't about how hard you hit. It's about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward. How much you can take and keep moving forward. That's how winning is done. You've got to be willing to take the hits. They're not pointing fingers saying, you ain't where you want to be because of him or her or anybody. Cowards do that, and that ain't you. You're better than that. And now imagine hearing God speak to you in the voice of Rocky as Rocky finishes this speech to his maturing child. And to this last part, I've made a few minor edits so as to biblicize it just a tad. I'm always gonna love you, no matter what. No matter what happens. You're my son. Wash clean in your savior's blood. He gives you eternal life. But until you start to live what you believe, you ain't gonna have a life. It's profound, isn't it? Related to this, let me tell you another story, as we're going to begin to draw to a close here shortly. I think it was a month or two ago, I shared a tale that made the French appear to be cowards. And you know, I'm pretty sure there are a lot of Frenchmen that are cowards. but I'm pretty sure there are some Frenchmen, very many who are not. And so to even the scales for our Frenchy French friends, I am going to share with you a different story. As legend has it, there was a time when Napoleon felt the need to retreat from battle. And so he called over one of his commanders and he gave the order for him to instruct the bugler to sound the retreat. And so the commander, he sent a message to the bugle player who read the message, and then he proceeded to sound out the call to charge. Shocked by this, Napoleon told the commander to correct that bugler at once and tell him to play the call to retreat. And so the commander did, but once again, the player sound out the call to charge. an apoplectic Napoleon, he went and he found that bugler himself and asked him why he played the call to charge when he was told to play the call to retreat. Now, I'm not entirely sure this is historically accurate. It's a legendary kind of a story, but the point resonates just the same. The bugler is said to have looked his leader Napoleon in the eye one of the great military generals of all time, he looks him in the eye and he is reported to have said, sir, you did not teach me to play the call to retreat, only the call to charge. Hearing this, Napoleon told the young man to continue sounding the call to charge. which he did, and then as the story goes, when all the French soldiers saw Napoleon's courage and confidence in the face of adversity, they charged forward and they won the battle. Now, of course, the story could have ended with Napoleon unsheathing his sword and lopping off the head of that bugler. That could have happened. Or that charge forward could have actually taken place as it did, supposedly, but it could have resulted in a bloody setback for their efforts at military conquest. Because as Rocky said, the world ain't all sunshine and rainbows. But here's the thing. For followers of Christ, we know For Christ's followers, life will one day be all sunshine and rainbows. Glory awaits. And we get a taste of it now almost as an hors d'oeuvre while we eat from the table in the wilderness. But we know the full meal awaits when the kingdoms of this world fall once and for all to the eternal kingdom of God. Now what do we do in the meantime? We keep our eyes open, recognizing the fact of the beast rising up out of the sea. And we understand we can't beat the beast in our own strength. And we stubbornly or naively, we try to do so all the time, don't we? But we can't do it. We know this is true. But we also know, as students of the Bible, we're not called to do it. We are called to stand strong in the faith, not retreating, and keep moving forward in humble obedience to Christ. Christ beats the beast. We just obey Christ. And what's this look like for you? Oh, might mean growing up, exiting your red pill cage stage. Start consistently treating others as image bearers of God. Might mean not taking the bait to enter into all the political drama around you. Might mean wisely keeping a safe distance from a parent or a sibling while still seeking to share our Lord's truth with them. Might mean taking a rest from trying to fix someone else. Just model good Christian behavior as an example that they might one day emulate. Might mean turning your sights to the mirror. Ending the habit of justifying your ungodly attitudes and actions by blaming others might mean trusting God's plan so that you can be realistic and yet hope for the best. And it might mean letting go of things in the past and allowing yourself to ask others, including God himself, for help. Whatever it means for you, I encourage you to start taking action on it today. Even now as you pray. Father, you are a good God, a big God, a strong God, and we are thankful for that. because we face many daggers from the enemy on a daily basis, and we grow weary. We have a tendency, a propensity, really, to try to lean in our own strength, our own understanding, pull ourselves up by our bootstraps. Help us to have a heavier dependence on you, to lean upon you, to press into your word, to seek your face in prayer, and to go about the business of humbly submitting to the truth of your word. You've laid out your plan for us. We know what it is. We know the enemy, the beast rising from that big, dangerous, scary sea is He's already a dead man walking, already a defeated foe. So help us to walk in that victory, knowing that for now we walk in victory as we walk in the wilderness, totally dependent on your provision. Lord, we ask that you would guide our time of discussion, that you would touch the hearts and minds of those who have heard your word preached today. That lives will be transformed. And those that need to understand that there actually is truth, that that truth is you. And that truth is that you are the way and you are the life. Give us endurance, Lord. Give us wisdom. It's in Christ's name we pray. Amen. So I'm going to shut down the stream here. Again, I encourage you to check us out online if you like at householdoffaithinchrist.com. Until next week, I guess that'd be 167 and a half hours or so from about now. God bless.