Insightful Musings on the Scriptures
by
Raymond P. Sparre
Northwest University class of '67
Good morning, dear ones.
We plan to do our walk thing in a few minutes. You’ll notice that I did not add the word “jog” this time. I plan to just walk. Something is amiss in my old-man left knee. So I think I need to back off from stressing it.
I’m wearing my “high-viz” vest—which we do regularly when out on the side of this highway. Seeing me in that vest is one of the stimuli that gets Dandy all revved up. I told him he needs to find a ball first. But then he tells me he doesn’t know where any are and gets all frustrated—then fastens his glare on me saying, “Come on, dude—don’t hold out on me—I know you know where a ball is.” I caved again.
OK, Becki is here now, petting the kitty who is laying on my work table. She likes to follow me in here each morning—it’s warm and I always give her a dish of food. She’s getting bigger around the middle all the time. We know she’s hiding some growing babies in there. I’m not sure when we will prove that—but we will in time.
Blessings on your day. Love—Ray.
The “he” of this statement is, of course, “the antichrist” who is here called “the beast”—scheduled to arise on the international scene to wield world-wide power and control. (I sure see a lot of evidence that the world is ripening for his emergence.) The phrase to which I want to give further attention is “was given.” It is repeated 3 times in this paragraph (vv. 5, 7). Given by whom? I believe the answer is in layers. I would peel the onion something like this:
- Political power. That would mean that his position and opportunity for gaining such control was largely granted to him via the popular votes of the people or the powers that be. Understand the inherent dangers within a democratic form of government—which is the ideal of typical Americans—that corrupt people naturally vote in corrupt leaders. (I recently heard a simple yet profound statement that speaks to this general rule—“You cannot establish a conservative government within a liberal culture.” Selah.)
- Diabolical power. According to Biblical revelation, behind the political scenery are evil spiritual forces. Verse 2 says that “the dragon (Satan) gave the beast his power and his throne and great authority.” Verse 4 says that “men worshipped the dragon because he had given authority to the beast, and they also worshipped the beast.”
- Divine power. Herein is our only hope and security, because behind the realms of the will of man and all that spiritual darkness is the Transcendent and Sovereign Power and Will of God. His Will WILL be done “on earth as it is in heaven.” The Almighty is the real source of all lesser “mighties.” And the strong message throughout Scripture is that the measure of His control is determined by the quality of choices men make within the freedoms He allows. My reading today in Proverbs 21 gives support for this: “The king’s heart is in the hand of the Lord; he directs it like a watercourse wherever he pleases”(v.1). And consider again verse 30: “There is no wisdom, no insight, no plan that can succeed against the Lord.”
I don’t have to wonder who the ultimate winners are—or what side I want to be on. And it doesn’t really matter how things play out—whether or not we are to be snatched out of here by a secret rapture before all this horrific persecution breaks out. The end of verse 10 still remains a bottom-line requirement for all believers everywhere in all time—“This calls for patient endurance and faithfulness on the part of the saints”—the constancy of a “HEART AFTER GOD.”
“Men fail oftener from want of perseverancethan from want of talent.”