Daily Lesson for November 9, 2018

Today’s Daily Lesson comes from Revelation chapter 17 verses 1 through 8:

Then one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls came and said to me, ‘Come, I will show you the judgement of the great whore who is seated on many waters, 2with whom the kings of the earth have committed fornication, and with the wine of whose fornication the inhabitants of the earth have become drunk.’ 3So he carried me away in the spirit into a wilderness, and I saw a woman sitting on a scarlet beast that was full of blasphemous names, and it had seven heads and ten horns. 4The woman was clothed in purple and scarlet, and adorned with gold and jewels and pearls, holding in her hand a golden cup full of abominations and the impurities of her fornication; 5and on her forehead was written a name, a mystery: ‘Babylon the great, mother of whores and of earth’s abominations.’ 6And I saw that the woman was drunk with the blood of the saints and the blood of the witnesses to Jesus.

When I saw her, I was greatly amazed. 7But the angel said to me, ‘Why are you so amazed? I will tell you the mystery of the woman, and of the beast with seven heads and ten horns that carries her. 8The beast that you saw was, and is not, and is about to ascend from the bottomless pit and go to destruction. And the inhabitants of the earth, whose names have not been written in the book of life from the foundation of the world, will be amazed when they see the beast, because it was and is not and is to come.

This scene in the book of Revelation is full of hidden political meaning and message. It references now obscure, yet at the time very oppressive political leaders and regimes. The message is intended to prepare the faithful for the need for endurance.

The faithful ought not to wonder at or dismay at the persistence of evil in the world. The beast seems to ascend again and again from the bottomless pit. Its tenacity appears unconquerable. Those “whose names are not written in the book of life” are “amazed” by its seeming invincibility. This is why so many were even more taken with Hitler when he was able to survive so many assassination plots. He gained an aura of indomitability.  The beast seemed unbeatable.

Yet, the faithful hold out. They do not wonder, or marvel, or give themselves over to dismay. They hope and they trust. They know the beast is strong — enduringly so. But they know something else also. They know that in the end, the Lamb wins.