The Final
Humiliation
“Then the
dragon was enraged at the woman
and went off to make war against
the rest of her offspring –
those who obey God’s
commandments and hold to the
testimony of Jesus…. He was
given power to make war against
the saints and to conquer them.
And he was given authority over
every tribe, people, language and
nation.”
-Revelation
12:17; 13:7
If you read
through Revelation 12, you will
discover that the devil was
humiliated five times in that
chapter. In verse 4, the devil
tried to kill Baby Jesus through
the sword of King Herod, but he
failed. (Matthew 2:16) In verse
5, the devil was able to kill
Jesus through the Jews, but he
could not keep Jesus in the tomb.
(Acts 10:39,40) In verses 6 and
14, the devil tried to destroy
the believers in Christ for 1,260
years, but the church went into
hiding, and God’s Word and
His people survived. In verse 7,
the devil tried to hold his
position in Heaven’s senate
(Job 1:6,7), but Jesus took his
chair. The devil was thrown out
of Heaven on Resurrection Sunday!
(John 12:31; Revelation 12:8,9)
In verse 15, the devil tried to
terminate the Protestant
Reformation through war in Europe
(Psalm 124:2-4), but God opened a
place of religious refuge for
Protestants that was the United
States of America. Therefore,
after being humiliated five
times, the devil is
understandably furious and
focused on the next war. He knows
that his time is short
(Revelation 12:12), and he is
expecting that was six will begin
any day. (Revelation 12:17) The
was described in Revelation
13:1-8.
This may
surprise you, but God will allow
the devil to win the upcoming
war. Read this twice: “…
He was given power to make war
against the saints and to
conquer them. And he
was given authority over every
tribe, people, language and
nation…. For forty-two
months.” (Revelation 13:
7 italics mine) How does the
devil achieve total control of
Earth?
Violence,
idolatry, moral degeneracy and
sexual immorality have filled up
Earth’s cup of sin. Since
1994, the four angels (Revelation
7:1-4) have been holding back
God’s judgments for almost
ten years. Soon, Jesus will
pummel Earth with a series of
devastating judgments. Jesus will
startle the world with the
reality of His coming kingdom.
Jesus intends to separate the
sheep from the goats with a test
of worship. His coming judgments
will include a global earthquake,
a swath of meteoric firestorms
(which will dwarf the recent
fires in California), two
horrific asteroid impacts, and
afterwards, great darkness will
cover a third of Earth. (This
darkness may be caused by ejecta
released from many volcanos.)
Altogether, these judgments will
cause the sudden death of 1.5
billion people (Revelation 6:8),
and as you might expect, the
survivors will be frightened and
subdued beyond words. Because the
governments and infrastructures
of the world will be in shambles,
political leaders will turn to
their religious leaders for
answers. The religious leaders of
the world will unanimously agree
that a Crisis Government should
be created to appease God so that
His judgments will cease –
or no one will survive His wrath.
The Bible indicates that
political leaders will “go
along” and the Crisis
Government will demand that
everyone worship God.
The word
“worship” is mentioned
three times in Revelation 13:4
and 8 because the leaders of the
Crisis Government will declare
worship to be THE solution to
appeasing God’s wrath and
who can disagree? Think about
this: When the infrastructures of
communication, transportation,
commerce, manufacturing and
medical care are in shambles,
when 1.5 billion people lie
unburied in the streets, and when
thousands of coastal cities have
totally disappeared because of
the tidal waves caused by an
asteroid impact upon an ocean,
who will be able to argue that
worship isn’t THE solution?
Desperate circumstances justify
desperate actions. Even the
144,000 will be saying, “…
Worship Him who made the Heavens,
the Earth, the sea and the
springs of water.” (Revelation
14:7) The Bible says, “The
whole world was astonished and
followed [did not resist] the
beast [the Crisis
Government]. (Revelation 13:3,
insertions mine) In other words,
a time and a circumstance is
coming when the diverse religions
of the world will agree that
worshiping God is THE solution to
appeasing God’s anger. In
this context, a searching
argument will rise: What does God
require for worship?
By definition,
worship is an act of submission,
showing respect for God’s
authority. Remember the story of
Cain and Abel? Both men worshiped
God, but God refused to accept
Cain’s worship because Cain
did not submit to God’s
demand for an animal sacrifice.
(Genesis 4, 1 John 3:12) This
made Cain angry and he killed his
brother who humbly submitted to
God’s authority. There is
important end-time parallel here.
The devil will enable demonically
controlled religious and
political leaders to enforce laws
demanding worship in ways that
are blatantly contrary to the law
of God. However, the saints will
choose to obey God’s
commandments (specifically, the
fourth commandment) and refuse to
obey the laws of the Crisis
Government. Consequently,
demonically controlled people
will persecute the saints for
religious reasons for 42 months.
For fear of persecution, “All
inhabitants of Earth will worship
the beast [the Crisis
Government] –all whose
names have not been written in
the Book of Life belonging to the
Lamb that was slain from the
creation of the world.” (Revelation
13:8) Even though the devil will
be successful for 1,335 days, his
reign will end. The devil will be
soundly defeated in his seventh
war against God, and he will be
destroyed in his eighth.
“For the time
will come when men will not put
up with sound doctrine. Instead,
to suit their own desires, they
will gather around them a great
number of teachers to say what
their itching ears want to hear.
They will turn their ears away
from the truth and turn aside to
myths.” - 2 Timothy 4:3,4
During the past
five years, terrorists have used
the murder/martyrdom technique to
draw attention to their causes.
Of course, murder/martyrdom dates
from antiquity (review
Samson’s death in Judges
16:30), but the frequency of
people killing themselves in
order to kill others has grown
substantially in recent years.
Terrorism is a demonic genie that
has been let out of the bottle in
which no one can put back. The
world cannot return to where it
was before 9/11. The war in Iraq
proves that even the most
powerful and best-equipped army
on Earth cannot stop sneaky acts
of violence against unsuspecting
civilians. Every time I
hear of a murder/martyr attack, I
think of this text: “The
Lord saw how great man’s
wickedness on the earth had
become [in Noah’s day], and
that every inclination of the
thoughts of his heart was on evil
all the time…. So the Lord
said, “I will wipe mankind,
whom I have created, from the
face of the earth – men and
animals, and creatures that move
along the ground, and birds of
the air – for I am grieved
that I made them.’”
(Genesis 6:5,7, insertion mine)
The bulk of
today’s murder/martyrdom
phenomenon springs from hatred,
and as strange as this may sound,
humiliation is the root cause.
Lucifer was the first to be
humiliated when the Father told
him that he could not have the
exalted position and worship that
belonged to Jesus. (Isaiah
14:13-15; Ezekiel 28:13-17) Deep
hatred caused Lucifer to lie and
scheme among the angels. He
eventually led one-third of the
angels to join in an attempt to
murder Jesus so that he could
take Christ’s place. Murder
was the only way he could achieve
what he wanted. Centuries later,
when Jesus publicly humiliated
Jewish leaders with their own
words, they wanted to kill Him.
Jesus responded, “You
belong to your father, the devil,
and you want to carry out your
father’s desire. He was a
murderer from the beginning [of
sin], not holding to the
truth, for there is no truth in
him. When he speaks lies, he
speaks his native language, for
he is a liar and the father of
lies.” (John 8:44,
insertion mine) Jesus said
Lucifer was a murderer from the
beginning because hatred is the
natural response of the carnal
heart when humiliated.
Cain was
humiliated when God showed
deference to Abel’s
sacrifice. Instead of asking
himself why God did not honor his
offering, Cain loathed Abel. He
suspected that God would make
Abel “the first born of
creation” and rather than
repent of his arrogance, Cain
killed Abel. Fro similar reasons,
the Jewish leaders murdered
Jesus. His wisdom and teachings
humiliated them and they did not
want Him to take their place.
(Acts 10:39; Luke 13:17; John
11:50; 12:10) Hatred rises when
humiliation occurs and unless
there is a speedy recovery
through the renewing power of the
Holy Spirit, hatred can fester
into a gnawing desire for revenge
and retaliation.
Because hatred
leads to murder, the Bible
declares, “Anyone who
hates his brother is a murderer,
and you know that no murderer has
eternal life in him.” (1
John 3:15) Of course, there are
different forms of humiliation,
but the outcome depends upon the
core attitude of the heart. If a
person has a meek attitude,
humiliation is a powerful
learning experience. If a person
has a proud heart and a stubborn
head, humiliation can be
devastating. In this latter case,
hatred forms because the carnal
heart hates humiliation
– being made to appear
inferior. Hatred starts as a
feeling and ends up as an
attitude. Jesus said, “Everyone
who does evil hates
the light, and will not come into
the light for fear that his deeds
will be exposed.” (John
3:20, italics mine) So, what
happens when pride and religious
arrogance are humiliated by
truth? The murder of Jesus
answers the question.
We have entered an
age of rage, anger, and hatred.
Social tensions are mounting.
Economic tensions are high.
Ethnic tensions are growing.
Religious tensions are evident.
The world is rapidly coming to a
boiling point, which brings me to
the point mentioned in the first
part of this segment. During the
Great Tribulation, there will be
a bold and glorious presentation
of God’s truth. The 144,000
will humiliate the religions of
the world with speech inspired by
the Holy Spirit, accompanied by
powerful signs and miracles.
Hatred will rise up in the hearts
of those who hate truth. No
wonder Jesus said, “A
man’s enemies will be
members of his own
household.” (Matthew
10:36) Love for truth is not
genetic. Love for truth has
nothing to do with church
experience or affiliation. Love
for truth, like hatred, begins as
a feeling and grows into an
attitude; but unlike hatred, love
sets us free to learn more truth.
Love enables us to forgive our
enemies and leave revenge in
God’s awesome hands. (Romans
12:19)
In the first part
of this segment, I mentioned the
devil will be defeated for the
seventh time at the Second
Coming. During the seven last
plagues, the devil will be
publicly humiliated (fifth bowl).
In a rage, the devil will gather
the armies of Earth together in a
massive attempt to murder Jesus
when He appears. “They [the
ten kings] have one purpose
and will give their power and
authority to the [lamb-like] beast.
They will make war against the
Lamb, but the Lamb will overcome
them because he is Lord of lords
and Kings of kings….” (Revelation
17:13,14, insertions mine) Of
course, the wicked will perish,
but once again, murder will be
seen as the horrible fruit of
hatred. If there is any hatred in
your heart, ask Jesus to give you
victory over it. He will!
