Revelation 17:1-18

The Punishment of the Great Prostitute
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Because Israel failed to keep God’s covenant, Plan A was abandoned. Jerusalem is no longer the city of God. The city of God is now called “New Jerusalem.”

 

The great prostitute is defined as “the great city” that rules over the kings of Earth because the parallel here is obvious.

 

Lucifer claiming to be Almighty God will rule over the world when he sets up his theocratic government.  The Great City will not have walls, because it will be a universal government.

 

Lucifer will rule over the kings of Earth. They will use their civil authority to enforce religious laws. This is the result of Babylon’s intoxicating wine.

 

3.   The great prostitute “sits on many waters” – that is, she sits on (controls) the diverse nations of Earth.

 

Why does God use waters to describe the wicked nations of Earth?

 

Continents are filled with people much like oceans are filled with water. In this analogous sense, waters represent “a sea of diverse human beings.”

 

Water conforms to the shape and dimensions of the container that it is put in.

 

The wicked submit to Lucifer’s government are like water…. They conform to the situation in which they find themselves in order to survive. They value only their life, nothing else – there is nothing greater.

 

This is in stark contrast to God’s people who stand firm for the right no matter what.

 

Living by faith means doing whatever is right no matter what and leaving the consequences to God.

 

Matthew 10:39   Whoever finds [a way to save] his life will lose it, and whosoever loses his life for my sake will find it.”

 

So the great prostitute sits upon many waters. Lucifer’s theocratic government rules over multitudes, nations and peoples and languages.

 

The great prostitute will control all buying and selling.

 

4.   The kings of the Earth committed adultery with her

 

(They will give the prostitute their civil powers for religious purposes.)

 

5.   The people of Earth were intoxicated with the wine of her adulteries . . .

 

This language indicates the wicked are willfully deceived . . .

 

6.   She wears purple and scarlet. . . .

    

She is rich. She controls all the nation’s wealth and she controls all of life’s necessities.

 

7.   She has a gold cup, full of abominable things and the filth of her adulteries . . .

 

Although her form may be beautiful and attractive, the prostitute is a vile woman and is disgusting to those who value righteousness. . .   

8.   She is drunk with the blood of saints. . .

 

She is like Jezebel who did her best to kill all of God’s prophets. . . .

 

9.   She wears this title: MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF PROSTITUTESAND THE ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH.”

 

The “mystery” of the prostitute is this: Individuals would rather rebel against God and willfully violate their conscious and exchange their soul for meager rations to survive on this doomed planet for a few more days.

 

Such thinking is pure defiant rebellion, perfect nonsense.

 

The title given to the prostitute describes an evil process that ends with great achievement. This woman is the terminus, the end result of 6,000 years of false religion. She, and all within her, are beyond redemption. She is demon possessed. She has a soul of a demon. She is the bride of Lucifer.

 

(I hope you will take time to review Ezekiel 23. Take a look at the parallel between ancient Israel and the great prostitute.)

 

Reviewing. . . .  

 

Revelation 17:6   I saw that the woman was drunk with the blood of the saints, the blood of those who bore the testimony to Jesus. When I saw her, I was greatly astonished.

 

Revelation 17:7   When the angel said to me: “Why are you astonished? I will explain to you the mystery of the woman and of the [composite] beast she rides, which has the seven heads and ten horns. 

 

Carefully notice this: The angel tells John that he is going to explain the mystery of the woman and the composite beast she rides, then in the next verse, the angel “jumps” to another beast – the beast that rises from the abyss.

 

He does this because one has to first understand the great red dragon (the beast from the abyss) before he can understand the woman that is Lucifer’s theocratic government.

 

So, the angel reviews some things that John has already seen:

 

Revelation 17:8   The beast [the great red dragon in Revelation 12], which you saw [cast out of Heaven], once was [visible] now is not [visible], and will come up out of the Abyss [and become visible] and go to his destruction. The inhabitants of earth whose names have not been written in the book of life from the creation of the world will be astonished when they see the beast, because he once was [visible], now is not [visible], and yet will come [up out of the Abyss and be visible to everyone].

 

Revelation 17:9   “This calls for a mind of wisdom. The seven heads [on the composite beast] are seven hills on which the woman sits.

 

Revelation 17:10   They are also seven kings, five have fallen, one is, the other has not yet come; but when he does come, he must remain for a little while.

 

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