Merry Christmas - day 9
[The beast] causes all ...
to be marked on the right hand
or forehead, so that
no one can buy or sell
who does not have the mark,
that is, the number of the beast ...
It's number is six hundred sixty-six
Revelation 13:16-18
In Sunday School, my kids this year are asking, "Why does the number forty keep cropping up in all these stories?"
I said, "I think God wants us to see him. Therefore, he tends to work things in familiar patterns so that we might just stop and say, 'I wonder ...?'"
Forty is not the only Biblical number of significance. Twelve is important -- twelve tribes, twelve disciples. Three is important -- in addition to the Trinity, Jesus often took with him three disciples -- Peter, James, and John -- to his most important events. In addition, when you repeated something three times, it's meaning grew exponentially until by the third time it meant "to the highest degree."
Seven is another key number. Seven was viewed as perfection.
Six, therefore, was by definition less than perfect. Therefore, 666 meant "imperfect, imperfect, imperfect-to-the-highest-degree." That is Satan and his Antichrist ... and not just imperfect ... pure evil.
On our foreheads, God wants to mark us with his cross. Satan wants to mark us with his alternative.
In our world today, we can easily imagine a "mark" that allows us to participate in commerce or not. We can imagine a microchip imbedded inside our skin. And we can imagine -- with the rampant degree of identity theft -- governments "requiring" such marks so as to guard us against fraud.
It's ironic, though ... God already provide us with unique marks. Our fingerprints are unique. The patterns of our eyes and pupils are unique. If God made us perfect and unique, why would we ever want to accept a mark that makes us imperfect and part of the masses?
In Christ's Love,
a guy who is thankful
that God made me as me.
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