The Revelation 13 Connection
In the first 2 chapters of Daniel the issues were obedience and loyalty to God. Here in chapter 3 this is taken one step further to include the issue of worship. Here in chapter 3 we have an attempt by the powers that be to impose a form of false worship on the people. And the whole world apparently is willing to go along with the idea, all that is except for three young men who dared to stand firm for God when the whole world bowed down before an image of gold.
Now there is more than a passing resemblance in what happened that day long ago on the plain of Dura and the events presented in Revelation 13: And that is by design. The stories in Daniel illustrate the experiences that God’s people will go through near the end of time. They illustrate the kind of living faith, of solid determination to remain loyal to God no matter what, that God’s people in the last days will need. And the story found in this chapter illustrates one of the greatest crises, one of the greatest tests of faith that God’s people will be called on to endure at the end of time. It is a test that will shake out every pretender, leaving behind only those who love the Lord above all else, even more than their own lives, those whose faith cannot be shaken by the scorn, the ridicule, or the threats of the world.
Revelation 13 tells us that at the end persecuting authorities will erect a symbolic image and require everyone to worship it. Increasingly severe penalties will be imposed to compel this worship, beginning with severe economic sanctions and ending with death decrees. Daniel 3 tells about an attempt to compel the worship of a literal image under pain of death. It also tells how God stood by those who stood for Him.
Keeping in mind the lessons of Daniel 3, let us take a brief look at Revelation 13.
Revelation 13:11-12 Then I saw another beast coming up out of the earth, and he had two horns like a lamb and spoke like a dragon. And he exercises all the authority of the first beast in his presence, and causes the earth and those who dwell in it to worship the first beast, whose deadly wound was healed.
I will not be going into a discussion on the identity of the beasts mentioned in this passage at this time. Right now we are most interested in the issue of worship. Here, as in Daniel 3, the real issue is loyalty to God, and the worship of God and of God alone in the face of overwhelming pressure to participate in the worship of the beast in the place of God.
Signs and Wonders
Revelation 13:13-14 He performs great signs, so that he even makes fire come down from heaven on the earth in the sight of men. And he deceives those who dwell on the earth by those signs which he was granted to do in the sight of the beast, telling those who dwell on the earth to make an image to the beast who was wounded by the sword and lived.
Once again, an image is being set up. Not an image of wood or stone or even of gold as the image on the plain of Dura was, but an image none the less. But then again, perhaps in its own way it is a golden image after all, for as we shall see in verses 16 and 17, if you refuse to worship this image you will not be able to buy or sell anything at all.
Revelation 13:15 He was granted power to give breath to the image of the beast, that the image of the beast should both speak and cause as many as would not worship the image of the beast to be killed.
Tell me, is this beginning to look familiar. It should. Revelation 13 is Daniel 3 played out on a global scale. In the story of Daniel 3, God has graciously given us an actual case history of just exactly this kind of situation. In Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, God has shown us the character that God’s people must have in the end if they are to successfully resist the overwhelming pressures placed on them to worship the image. God has shown us the kind of determined faith that we must have even in the face of death, even when there appears to be absolutely no possibility of deliverance. Remember, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego saw no token of deliverance before they were tossed into the fire. Not until they were actually tossed into the flames did God intervene.
So it will be in the end. There will come a time when to all appearances it will seem as if evil has won and God’s people have been abandoned by God and left to their own fate, and they will echo Jesus’ cry on the cross when he said “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me.” But God’s people are not forsaken. This last trial that God’s people will have to face will reveal to all the world whose are God’s and whose are Satan’s. It will purge all pretenders. Only those who have a real and personal relationship with Jesus will remain.
Worshiping the Beast
Revelation 13:16-17 He causes all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hand or on their foreheads, and that no one may buy or sell except one who has the mark or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.
Here is why so many, almost the whole world, will worship the beast and its “golden” image — MONEY!!! To be brutally honest, money is the god of this world. It is even the god of many who call themselves Christian. People will go to almost any lengths for it. You threaten to take away their money, to take away their ability to buy or sell, and you will be amazed how quickly the vast majority, will rationalize all kinds of reasons why it is ok for them to worship the beast, or at least to pretend to worship the beast and its image.
Revelation 14:7 Saying with a loud voice, “Fear God and give glory to Him, for the hour of His judgment has come; and worship Him who made heaven and earth, the sea and springs of water.”
At the same time that the beast is commanding all people, on pain of death, to worship the image to the beast, (At the same time that the beast is enforcing its command to worship the image with severe economic sanctions), God also calls all people to worship Him, the only true God, the Creator of heaven and earth.
When the Crisis Comes
It is easy to be brave before the crisis comes, it is easy to be brave when you are standing with the crowd, but it is when the crisis comes and we must stand alone that we see ourselves as we really are.
Jeremiah 12:5 “If you have run with the footmen, and they have wearied you, Then how can you contend with horses? And if in the land of peace, In which you trusted, they wearied you, Then how will you do in the floodplain of the Jordan?”
Jesus told a parable about two men who found themselves facing a crisis. “Therefore whoever hears these sayings of Mine, and does them, I will liken him to a wise man who built his house on the rock: and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it did not fall, for it was founded on the rock. But everyone who hears these sayings of Mine, and does not do them, will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand: and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it fell. And great was its fall.” (Matthew 7:24-27).
There is one major lesson in the story of the wise and foolish builders that we want particularly to notice. The storm does not change foundation upon which the house is built. When the crisis comes in your life, you don’t change foundations. The crises only reveals upon what foundation you have already built. It is only after the storm, when rebuilding takes place that foundations are changed.
Therefore it is the love of God that allows the small winds to blow against us to show us our true condition beforehand, so that we can prepare for the big winds that are to come before it’s all over. God’s love allows the small winds to blow, to open our eyes to our true condition, before the big storms come. He allows us to be tested by the footmen, so that we will know how we are going to do with the horses. (Jeremiah 12:5). Can you appreciate that kind of love?