Preached by Andrew Smellie, July 1, 2007

True disciples have been given the power to resist Satan’s attacks!

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Resist the devil.
Persist in your faith.
Desist in your neutrality.

This sums up John’s challenge in Revelation 12-13 to all those who would fear God more than their human enemies in the first century. Satan’s single-minded focus has always been to pull as many disciples back into his world as he can, knowing that he will therefore win the battle for many other souls once the true disciples are taken out of the battle. And that is why his attack on the standard of discipleship and God’s church is so insidious and so brutal. Andrew breaks down the intense imagery and explains how it was meant to wake up the believer then and meant to motivate us to uphold God’s Word now!
“The Dragon Empire Strikes Back”
Preached by Andrew Smellie
Sunday, July 1, 2007

Revelation 12:1-17
• Revelation was written to persecuted Christians in the first century using symbolism to inspire.
• Many disciples were so committed to the cause that they would be willing to die for it.
• There appears this woman who represented the people of God from the crown on her head.
• The sun represented the glory of God.
• The moon represented people ruling all celestial creation.
• The dragon was Satan who had great power, great wisdom and great authority.
• Satan has the desire to rule. Satan wants to rule your life.
• There was a partial judgment of the angels as well as man.
• The woman gave birth to a male child . . . Jesus.
• The woman representing the people of God, fled to a place prepared by God.
• God will take care of His people.
• One thousand two hundred and sixty days, which is three and a half years, represented the amount of time evil was allowed to reign.

There was a famous story in Roman and Greek mythology.
• There was a bad guy, a fierce dragon name Python.
• The protagonist, a female named Leto, gave birth to a child by Zeus; Apollo was her child.
• Apollo eventually grew up and killed Python.
• The Roman emperors loved to associate themselves with Apollo.
• Caesar Augustus was the first Roman emperor who wanted to be associated with Apollo.
• Nero was the second Roman emperor who wanted to be associated with Apollo.
• Nero persecuted and killed a lot of Christians.
• You see how God changed the story to give glory to Jesus and not to these human leaders?
• The demons: angels who turned bad.
• Michael - the archangel: the leader of the angels.
• Michael defeated Satan.
• The ancient serpent Satan - the accuser - is accusing disciples of Jesus Christ.
• But when he accuses you of being lustful, prideful and/or angry, he is right!!
• Jesus steps up for us; He takes the punishment for us.

Question: At times, do you not accuse yourself?
• You have self-pity instead of repentance. (For example, the whole “Woe is me!” attitude.)
• Satan wants you to be reminded of your past sins, your failures.

Question: Why give yourself to God?
Question: Why give a hundred and ten percent?
Question: How do you beat Satan at his own game?
• In the same way, when you get baptized, you are getting married to God.
Question: So when you repent and get baptized is that it?
• The test of faithfulness is preaching the Word of God.
Question: How can you not share it if you are grateful for all that God has given you?
• You preach the Word of God and you call people to change their lives because Jesus has done so much for them.
• Everything material is all scheduled to burn anyway.
• The only thing that matters is whether you go to heaven or not and who you can take with you.
• The only thing that will save you is the blood of Jesus.
• The devil knew that his time was short.
• God gave Israel wings to fly away from its enemies. (Exodus 19:4)
• Satan goes after young Christians because he is ticked off that they got baptized.
• The Jews gave birth to Christians, disciples of Jesus Christ; they are the offspring.

Question: How does the world soften the standard of Christianity?
• We have to get real about what is going on in the world.
• Satan goes after the offspring.
• If you do not work on your salvation with fear and trembling, then you won’t stand against Satan’s attacks which are a’comin’.
• You have to have a deep conviction about sin in the fellowship. (Joshua 7:1-26)

Question: If you were diagnosed with lung cancer, then would you say: “My lung has cancer”?
• Wouldn’t you say: “I have cancer!”? In the same way, you say: “I have sin!”
• The whole church suffers when one person suffers.
• The whole church rejoices when one person rejoices.
• Either you are devoted to righteousness or you are devoted to wickedness.
• Either you are hot or you are cold.
• You are holding to the Word of God even during persecution.

Question: Who is the author of confusion?
• A lot of people wrestle with guilt.
• Guilt comes from your conscience, when you break the Word of God.
• If you have guilt over your sin, then that means that you still have a conscience.
• We need to repent. We need to have a conviction that we are at war.
Question: Do you realize that you are at war from the moment that you wake up?

Question: Are you prepared for the battle?
• You get surprised when you suffer as if bad things are not supposed to happen to you.
• The world recruits you right on in.

Revelation 13:1-18
• These represented kingdoms. (Daniel 7:2-27)
• All of these empires were put into one beast.
• There was a singular threat to those who wanted to obey God.
Question: Do you obey God or do you obey the laws of the land?
• A head represented a king.
Question: What do people worship today?
• Everyone has a religion; everyone worships something or someone.
Question: Who is like the Roman Empire?
• The Roman emperor Nero blamed the fire on the Christians.
• Nero had disciples crucified, soaked in blood and lit on fire—to be human torches.
• Just because you are a disciple of Jesus Christ does not mean that you will escape suffering.
• Satan tries to discourage since you are a target.
• You cannot be surprised by Satan’s attack.
• The saints are the disciples of Jesus Christ, the Christians, the church.
• You’ve got to be faithful.

Question: Have you ever been so tired, so worn out and weary that you just prayed?
• We want to have a harvest of righteousness after having a harvest of sin this month in the church.
• With repentance comes refreshing. (Acts 3:19-20)
• Sin wastes so much time. (Genesis 6:5-6)
• To be Christ-like, you got to be disciplined and self-controlled.

Question: Have you ever been tempted to not be godly for one day? To take a break?
• Satan is whispering to you. He blinds you; he deceives you.
• There is guerilla welfare in your life.
• And Satan sets you up to take you out, when someone approaches you to talk to you about your sin—then you catch an attitude and say: “Woe!”
• Everyone in the church has got to have the same conviction and the same heart about being holy and repentance.
• Either you are a sellout to the world or you are sold out for God.

Chapter Twelve of the Book of Revelation: Resist the devil and overcome.
Chapter Thirteen of the Book of Revelation: Persist in the faith and overcome.
Chapter Fourteen of the Book of Revelation: Desist in your neutrality.

Question: What story does that remind you of?
• Elijah. (1 Kings 18:38)
• You have these mega-churches teaching false doctrine.
• Gematria: an ancient practice where people ascribed numbers to the letters of your name, and added them up, giving you a spefic, unique number. (Pompeii excavation grafitti refers to a person loving number such-and-such.)
• The purpose of citing the number 666 was not ultimate imperfection or evil.
Question: Who had done some of the most wicked persecution of all time?
• Nero. Nero in Hebrew can be spelled in two ways.
• There was a rumor in the first century that Nero came back to life after he committed suicide.
• The disciples of Jesus Christ felt as if that had been the case once his successor came to power.
• There is no place for neutrality. You got to pick a side.
“The hottest places in hell are reserved for those, who in times of great moral crisis, maintain their neutrality.” - John Fitzgerald Kennedy
• Mediocrity, complacency and neutrality are the mark of the beast.
• That will pull you away from God.

Question: Do I hate my sin?
• Sin: either you kill it or it will kill you.
• It cannot be “See you next Sunday!”
• The devil is at war with each and every one of you.

The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire written by Edward Gibbon.
1. The rapid increase of divorce. The family is the basis of human society.
2. Higher taxes for spending of public monies for free bread and circuses for the people.
3. The mad craze for pleasure, with sports becoming more exciting and brutal.
4. The building of gigantic armaments, when the real enemy was within.
5. The decay of religion — faith fading into formalism.

Question: What do you believe today? What does God know you need to repent of today?

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