REVELATION
SIMPLIFIED
CHAPTER 17.6
Gleanings
from the Book of Revelation:
A
Weekly Verse-by-Verse Bible Study Series
The
REVELATION
TO JOHN
Chapter
Seventeen
The
Great Tribulation
Parenthesis
Mystery
Babylon
(Religious
Babylon)
Preface
As
mentioned in the previous study, the continuation of the Babylonian cult
religion moved after the fall of the Babylonian Empire in 539 B.C. to the city
of Pergamum on the Anatolian Peninsula (Asian Minor, modern-day Turkey) where
it was located in John’s day. Bringing with them their sacred vessels, idols,
and images, the High priests, priests, and priestesses resettled and the symbol
of a serpent was erected as the emblem of their mystery cult (review Revelation
Studies 2:12a and 2:12b).
Attalus,
King, and Pontiff of Pergamum died in 133 B.C. and bequeathed the leadership of
the Babylonian priesthood to Rome. Many historians believe the Etruscans brought
with them the Babylonian religious practices as they emigrated from the region
of Pergamum to the Tuscan territory on the Italian Peninsula. Eventually, Rome
became the official headquarters of Babylonianism. They also set up a pontifex
(head priest, bishop, or pontiff) who would serve as the leader of the
Babylonian priesthood.
These
chief priests wore miters shaped like the head of a fish in honor of the
Philistine fish-god Dagon [the lord of life (cf. Judges 16:23; 1 Samuel 5:2-5)].
When the priesthood was established in Rome, the chief priest embraced the
title of Pontifex Maximus (Latin for the greatest priest. Pope in Greek is Pappas meaning father or supreme pontiff).
When
Julius Caesar, the first Roman Emperor, became the head of state, he was also
elected Pontifex Maximus. As a
result, Rome became the successor of religious Babylon (the seat of Satan –The merging of church and state). Thus, the
emperors of Rome continued to exercise the office of Supreme Pontiff until A.D.
312 when Roman Emperor Constantine the Great decreed Christianity as the State
Religion.
Afterward,
the title was conferred upon the bishops of Rome and is borne by the Pope today,
not the successor of the big fisherman, the Apostle Peter, but a direct replacement
to the high priest of the Babylonian mystery religion and the servant of the
fish-god Dagon for whom he wears, like his predecessors, the fisherman’s ring.
The
Fallacy of the First Pope
The
Apostle Peter is credited by Roman Catholic theologians as being the first pope
due to a misinterpretation of Jesus’ statement in Matthew:
Matthew 16:18 - And I say also unto thee, That thou art
Peter, and upon this Rock (Christ) I will build My
church; and
the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. And I will give unto thee the keys of the Kingdom
of Heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven:
and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.
Significantly,
Jesus chose to make that statement to Peter on the coasts of Caesarea Philippi
(not Rome) near the base of Mount Hermon, a sanctuary for the pagan nature god Pan.
Adjacent was Pan’s shrine, a cave believed by the pagans to be the Gates of Hades existing underneath its
deep spring.
In
response to Jesus’ question, “Whom do men
say that I the Son of man am? Peter answered and said, “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God” (cf. Matthew 16:13,
16).
Then
Jesus said unto Peter:
Matthew 16:17b - Blessed art thou, Simon
Barjona: for flesh and
blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but My Father which is in Heaven.
Additionally,
the church that Christ builds is spiritual.
The Gates of Hell shall not prevail is better translated: The Gates of Hell (Hades) will not hold
them captive – A direct contradiction to pagan thinking. In other words, there
is victory over the grave through the Resurrection of Jesus Christ. Once a
person receives Christ as his personal Saviour by belief in His death burial and
Resurrection, he then becomes part of the church invisible, and invincible.
Peter’s Relevancy
Peter was an ordinary, not well-educated, married man who was
poor by today’s standards – A Galilean. His Hebrew name was Simon Barjona (son
of Jonas). The Lord changed his name to Peter (meaning stone). So when Peter
answered the Lord’s question, Whom do
people say that I am? Peter’s response, the Son of the Living God, was revealed to him by God the Father. Then
Jesus said, “Upon this rock (boulder,
rock bed), I will (continue to) build My church, not on Peter the stone,
but on a solid foundation laid by Christ.
Therefore,
Peter is not being established as the first Pope or given the papacy in this
verse. Three critical New Testament passages were chosen to support this truth:
1 Corinthians 3:11 – For no one is able to lay another foundation, besides the One being already laid,
which is Jesus Christ. (BLB)
1 Peter 2:5-8 – Ye also, as
lively (living) stones, are built up a spiritual house, an holy
priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices [not animal as in the Old Testament], acceptable to God by Jesus Christ. Wherefore also it is contained in the Scripture,
Behold, I lay
in Sion (Jerusalem) a Chief Corner Stone,
elect, precious: and he that believeth on
Him shall not be confounded
(disappointed, disgraced, ashamed).
Acts 4:11-12 – This (Jesus)
is the Stone which was
set at nought (rejected, ignored, despised) of
you builders, which is become the Head of
the Corner (the Chief Corner
Stone). Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other Name under Heaven given
among men, whereby we must be saved.
So,
the foundation stone of the church to be built was Jesus Christ, not Peter. It
is Christ’s church and He has and is the supreme authority.
Keys
to the Kingdom
The
keys to the Kingdom:
i.e. the transfer of authority to Peter and the Apostles to preach and reveal
the Gospel of the Kingdom to the visible church [Greek, ekklēsia: A general term for calling
out a meeting or an assembly of people for a special (religious) purpose – In
context, a congregation or a body of believers, Jew or Gentile – Not a building
with a steeple].
Definition of Church
The church is a chosen assembly of people who have been saved
by grace through faith in Jesus Christ and baptized into His Body by the Holy
Spirit.
The Early Church
In the Old Testament, there was no mention of Christ building
a church or a Church Age. The early church began with an assembly of 120
disciples [learners, followers (men and women)] of Christ in Jerusalem (cf.
Acts 1:15) waiting in an upper room for the promise of the Father, a Comforter
– The Holy Spirit.
Jesus previously spoke to them of this event:
John 14:26 - But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost (Spirit), whom the Father will send in My name, He shall teach you
all things, and
bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you.
Jesus also spoke to them of this event in His
post-Resurrection body:
Luke 24:49 - And, behold, I send the promise of My Father upon you: but tarry ye in the city of Jerusalem, until ye be endued
with power from on High.
Later, in His post-Resurrection body, He appeared:
Acts 1:4-5 –And, (Jesus) being assembled together with
them,
commanded them that they
should not depart from Jerusalem, but wait
for the promise of the Father, which, saith He, ye
have heard of Me. For
John truly baptized with water; but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost not many days hence.
The Commission of the Church:
Acts 1:8 – But ye shall receive power,
after that
the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye
shall be witnesses unto Me both in Jerusalem, and in all
Judaea, and
in Samaria, and
unto the uttermost part of the earth.
In effect, Jesus told His disciples they would receive and be
energized by the power of the Holy Spirit to carry on His ministry (i.e., to
spread the Gospel message to the ends of the earth). So, they were to be
witnesses by evangelizing the world about the Messiah's death, burial, and
Resurrection.
Day of Pentecost
The Supernatural Birth of the Church
After praying in one accord, fifty days after Christ rose
from the dead, the Holy Spirit came upon them and they were all baptized by the
Spirit and fire, into one body. Note: Everyone was endued with the same power (by
spiritual baptism, not water baptism); not exclusive to Peter. Hence, the church
was born. This event is known as the beginning of the Church Age - A
fulfillment of the Prophet Joel:
Joel 2:28a - And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out My Spirit upon all flesh.
For the celebration of the feast of Pentecost, thousands of Jews
(some estimate as many as 200,000) from all over were in the city of Jerusalem.
Acts 6:2-12 identifies many areas from whence they came. Jerusalem became a
place of multilingualism.
Peter’s Sermon
A Galilean fisherman by trade, endowed by the inspiration and
power of the Holy Spirit, takes the lead, stands up, and does a little
street-corner evangelism. Amazingly, Peter lifted
up his voice (cf. Acts 2:14) and preached a sermon (the Gospel) that Bible
colleges and seminaries will later model after.
Acts 2:14b – Ye men of Judaea, and all ye that
dwell at Jerusalem, be this known unto you, and hearken to my words.
Acts 2:22-24 - Men of Israel, hear these words: Jesus of
Nazareth, a man approved by God to you by miracles and wonders and signs, which God did by Him in the midst, of you, as ye yourselves know: Him, being delivered by the determinate counsel and
foreknowledge of God, ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain:
Whom God hath raised up, having loosed the pains of death: because it was not possible that he should be holden (held) of it
(death).
Interestingly and supernaturally, everyone heard Peter's
message in their language.
The Spread of Christianity
From that one sermon, the church grew almost instantaneously. Three thousand souls were baptized (cf. Acts 2:41) and the Gospel spread
rapidly across the entire Roman Empire and beyond. Afterward, when the
foreigners left Jerusalem, they brought the Gospel message of salvation back
with them.
Peter preached his second sermon in Acts 4 and verse 4 and
the number of men who believed this time was about 5,000.
Acts 2:47b - And the Lord added to the Church daily such
as should be saved.
The Apostle Paul
After killing Christians, Paul, believing they were
blaspheming God, had an encounter with the Living Christ on the road to
Damascus, Acts Chapter 9 begins a great Gentile missionary and evangelism
program establishing churches almost everywhere Paul preached. Three missionary
journeys are documented in the Book of Acts.
Tradition has it that twenty years before the destruction of
Jerusalem (about 50 A.D), the church numbered 100,000. Gradually the church
headquarters moved from the mother church in Jerusalem to Ephesus where the
Apostle John spent his later years as an elder after his exile on Patmos.
Church
Leadership
As
the visible church grew, church leadership was initiated by Christ:
Ephesians 4:11 - And He gave some, apostles (commissioners, sent out ones); and
some, prophets (an inspired speaker of prophecy); and some, evangelists; and some, pastors (shepherds) and teachers; For the perfecting
(equipping) of the
saints, for
the work of the ministry, for the edifying (building
up of) of the Body of Christ. [Eligibility for church elders, see 1
Timothy 3:1-7]
Additionally, the position of a deacon was designated (cf.
Acts 6:2-4). Deacons were persons who serve or ministered to others under the
directives of the church elders. They were also to conform to the qualifications
outlined in 1 Timothy 3:8-15.
Summary
It is a historical fact that many churches began as home churches.
The Pauline Epistles addresses the growing pains of the early churches. For the
first three centuries nowhere in Scripture is Peter recognized as having
authority over the other Apostles or the church. Church bishops were obscure in
the early centuries and there was no officially recognized pope until much later.
Roman Catholic Theologians adamantly differ.
To
Present
During
the centuries of church history, the Christianity of the Roman Empire has
incorporated many pagan doctrines and Babylonian practices [too numerous to
document for this study] into church dogma. The Gospel was liberally substituted
by heathen philosophies until the Reformation of the Sixteenth Century.
Hence,
the mother church in Rome had borne many daughters. Presently, a host of
denominations exist merely as a homogenized ecumenical monstrosity, not
biblical Christianity. So, THE MOTHER OF
all HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH
will one day (most likely) find her way to Rome again to form the final form of
all religions packaged into one.
(Verse 6)
And I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and
with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus: and when I saw her, I wondered with
great admiration.
The imagery of this scene is vividly
astonishing. John is in wonderment that such a thing could happen as he gazes
upon the woman of verse 3, infamous for her idolatries - The harlot. And like
most harlots she is intoxicated, the difference, with the blood of God’s
people, as exampled below:
1. Those cults of antiquity who drank
sacrificial blood
2. Those unsparingly persecuted
throughout church history
3. Those during Tribulation who refused
the mark of the beast
The succeeding study will begin the
next section of the outline: The Description of the Beast (Vv. 7-14).
QUESTIONS:
1. The seat
of Satan moved from where to where?
2. Define Pontifex Maximus.
3. Who is the GREAT
HARLOT?
4. Why is she called the GREAT HARLOT?
5. What was Peter’s role among the 120 disciples?
6. How did the early church begin?
7. Why do you think blood is highlighted in verse 6?
If this study was a blessing to you, make it a blessing to others.
SAVE
AND FORWARD THIS LINK
