Background Music is “Beyond The Sunset.”

THE KINGDOM OF THE DRAGON

If you take a map of the Mediterranean Sea and color the waters red you will see a reasonably good silhouette of the head and thorax of a Great Red Dragon. It is no small coincidence then that it is from this region that God has told us that the Kingdom of the Dragon is going to arise. “And the ten horns which thou sawest are ten kings, which have received no kingdom as yet; but receive power as kings one hour with the beast. 13 These have one mind, and shall give their power and strength unto the beast.” Today we see the ten kingdoms of this prophecy in place around the Mediterranean Sea, but they are not yet of one mind, so they are continually at war amongst themselves. The stage is being set for the war between God’s two witnesses in Jerusalem and the forces of the Antichrist when he comes and unifies these ten kingdoms that are now in place.

…Thy kingdom come. Thy will come to pass, as in heaven, so upon the earth.

In the model prayer that the Lord gave us, He said we should pray that The Father’s kingdom would appear, and that this would be accomplished by His will coming to pass upon the earth in the fashion as it was coming to pass in Heaven. I do not think that Jesus was telling us that God’s will would not be accomplished on the earth if we did not pray for it, but rather, that in praying this prayer we would be identifying ourselves with His will for the earth as events that were going to be occurring in heaven would also be manifested upon the earth throughout the age. The Devil told Jesus in The Temptation that he would give him all of the kingdoms of the world if he would bow down and worship him. Satan told Jesus that the reason he could make this offer was because all of those kingdoms had been delivered to him to give to who ever he chose. I used to believe that meant that the Devil owned all of the kingdoms of the cosmos, but that is not what he said. He said he owned all of the kingdoms of oikoumene, a Greek word that can have several different meanings, one of which is the sense of “that which belonged or pertained to the former Grecian Empire.” Oikoumene has also been used in the New Testament to apply only to the lands of the Roman Empire, and has also been used to apply to the whole earth. So when we see the word “world” in use in scripture we have to try to understand what limits are placed upon it by the context in which it is used.

In the context of Luke 4:5-6 it would seem that we must understand that the world to which Satan referred could only be that portion of the earth that had been given to him. The truth of such an understanding will depend upon whether or not I can show you where the scripture actually indicates that some portion of the earth has actually be given to Satan to do with what he will. So I will say here that the truth of this assertion can be seen in the prophecy of Dan. 8:8-26. This prophecy concerns someone called the King of Grecia. The King of Grecia was the spiritual power behind the former Grecian Empire of Alexander the Great, and of the four kings that subdivided his empire when he died. According to this prophecy the region that was under the control of Alexander the Great was going to be given to the King of Grecia from the time of Alexander until that time in the last days when a king of fierce countenance will arise who will supernaturally destroy a mighty people, and then, by offering peace to the region, he will also bring about the destruction of the saints.

DANIEL 8:21-25

“And the rough goat is the king of Grecia: and the great horn that is between his eyes is the first king. 22 Now that being broken, whereas four stood up for it, four kingdoms shall stand up out of the nation, but not in his power. 23 And in the latter time of their kingdom, when the transgressors are come to the full, a king of fierce countenance, and understanding dark sentences, shall stand up. 24 And his power shall be mighty, but not by his own power: and he shall destroy wonderfully, and shall prosper, and practise, and shall destroy the mighty and the holy people. 25 And through his policy also he shall cause craft to prosper in his hand; and he shall magnify himself in his heart, and by peace shall destroy many: he shall also stand up against the Prince of princes; but he shall be broken without hand.”

This then is the plain and apparent sense of the scriptures. The regions of the former Grecian Empire have been given into Satan’s hand. Satan offered the kingdoms of this region to Jesus if Jesus would worship him. Jesus refused the offer, and Satan then began a thousand years of warfare in that region that ultimately resulted in the destruction of the Roman Empire by fragmenting it up to eventually become Europe in the west and ten kingdoms in the east. These ten kings in the east are eventually going to be unified and empowered by the Antichrist. This warfare was shown to John in a vision of the war in Heaven between Michael and his angels and Satan. This war has been going on since the birth of Jesus Christ, Because this region has been given to him, Satan is called the the King of Grecia. The King of Grecia is continually at work inspiring mankind toward the principles of the New World Order of Democratic humanism in opposition to Christ based Democracy, Laissez-faire Capitalism in opposition to regulated Capitalism, and imperial conquest in opposition to Gospel Conquest. The wars and rumors of war that Jesus told us about in Matthew 24:6 are the manifestation of the struggle between these two opposing forces of Satan and Christ, each inspiring men to accept their vision for the control of the earth.

According the John’s vision in the Revelation, Satan first tried to destroy Jesus from within the Roman Empire over which he was the spiritual king. When that did not work, he started the war in heaven. When he was defeated in heaven by Michael and his angels, he was cast down to earth where he first tried unsuccessfully to destroy both Israel and the church from within the Roman Empire. According to the vision John had of this battle, the earth helped the woman, Israel, and the remnant, the church, of her seed, Jesus Christ. That is to say Israel and the church were dispersed into lands all over the earth where Roman authority was too weak to be effective against them. This is what is pictured in the vision as the earth swallowing up the flood Satan sent them.

This flood of waters that proceeded from Satan’s mouth to pursue the woman Israel is symbolic of the people of Satan spewing forth their anti-Christian and anti-Jewish venom where ever they have located. It is this venom that has been responsible for the ethnic warfare against the Jews in every land to which they have fled since that day until the Jewish remnant and the lost tribes of Israel came to America to be hidden in the wilderness and protected by the two wings of a great eagle. This venom is now being directed toward both the church and the Jews in America by the venomous people of Satan.

As soon as he saw that his efforts to destroy Israel and the church were not going to be successful from with in the Roman Empire, Satan began his efforts to bring forth the kingdom of the ten kings in the region around the Mediterranean Sea. These ten kingdoms will eventually be united by the King of Grecia, who will be the Antichrist in person. The spirit of God is at work hindering Satan’s efforts to unite these ten kingdoms. This restraining work by the Holy Spirit will not continue indefinitely, but will be discontinued at some point in the future. According to 2 Thess. 2:7-8, the Antichrist will be revealed when this happens. But according to 2 Thess 2:3 the Antichrist will not be revealed before The Apostasy within the church occurs. It is therefore apparent, that the reason that the restraining influence of the Holy Spirit is removed is because of The Apostasy, when the church is no longer salt and light to the world and fit only to be trodden under the feet of men.. The forces that drive the apostasy is are the fear of death among weak hearted Christians and Jews, and the desire for peace at any price among the heathen.

Rev. 21:7-8 “He that overcometh shall inherit all things; and I will be his God, and he shall be my son. 8 But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death.”

Dan. 8:25 “And through his policy also he shall cause craft to prosper in his hand; and he shall magnify himself in his heart, and by peace shall destroy many: he shall also stand up against the Prince of princes; but he shall be broken without hand.”

There is a battle yet coming over Jerusalem in which the United States (the church and Ersatz Israel) and Eretz Israel will be alone in defending Eretz Israel against these ten kings. This war is going to involve the use of WMD’s of all types by both sides, and just before the Ten Kings are defeated by Jesus Christ at His return, two things are going to occur that will demoralize the church and Israel. First, the nations of Russia, Germany, Iran, Ethiopia, Libya, and Turkey are going to ally themselves with The Ten Kings, and secondly, the United States and Israel will be defeated in the battle for Jerusalem.

The defeat of the United States will most likely be precipitated not by a military defeat in the region, but as the result of some catastrophic judgments against her rendering her incapable of waging further war. Also, because of these events most of the church will apostate because of their belief in the myth that the church is going to be “raptured” before these things occur. The church will abandon the faith in large numbers, and the Antichrist will be revealed. The Jews will accept him as their Messiah, and time of the Judgment of God upon the earth will begin.

From the time that Rome destroyed the Temple until the fall of Constantinople to the Ottomans, the kingdoms of the west were preoccupied with bitter and exhausting struggles for supremacy among themselves while Satan raised up the armies of Islam in order to establish the ten kingdoms of prophecy in that region. But, as shown in the section entitled, “America in Prophecy,” God has also been at work I history raising up a nation to oppose Satan and his forces. Just as Babylon was raised up by Almighty God to fulfill His purpose in the captivity of the Jews, America has been raised up to protect and preserve the Jews, the lost tribes of Israel, and the church until she is finally defeated physically and spiritually in the battle for Jerusalem by the armies of the King of Grecia who will become manifested as the person of the Antichrist.

In Rev. 17:1-18, an angel explains the vision of a beast to John. In these verses John is shown a beast that is scarlet in color, the same as the Dragon that John saw in Heaven and which he related to us in Rev. 12:3-4 & 12-17. This is the beast that is explained to John in Rev. 17:7-18. So the question that comes to mind is, “Does the explanation of the beast in the Seventeenth Chapter of the Revelation refer to the dragon described in Chapter 12, or does it apply to the beast John described in Rev. 13:1-8?” There is no good reason to doubt that all three visions concern the same beast but from different perspectives and at different times. And there is every reason to believe that the Dragon is the power behind the rise of that empire and those ten Kingdoms.

In explaining the beast, the angel told John that the beast he had seen had existed once before, but that it did not exist at that time, and that it would exist again in the future before it went into perdition. But then, the angel told John in verses 9-14 that the seven heads on the beast represented seven mountains (kingdoms) over which the Whore of Babylon had control. John was also told that five of those kingdoms had already fallen at the time John was shown the vision, and that one of those kings was in existence at the time he was looking at the vision. And lastly, John was told that the seventh king would come to power sometime in the future from time that John had seen the vision. So we must understand that the kingdom that did not exist at the time that John saw the vision, but which would rise again in the future, cannot be Rome, because Romedid exist at the time that John saw the vision.

So Rome has to be represented as the 6^th head, the kingdom of which the angel said in Rev. 17:10, “One IS.” Therefore, a seventh kingdom has been prophesied that will arise in the region of the Mediterranean Sea after the disintegration of the Roman Empire. We are told that this seventh kingdom will not last long before it is replaced by an eighth king who will then unite the ten kings and with them wage war against the mighty and the holy people until they are destroyed by Jesus Christ at his return. We are at the end of this seventh kingdom now and time is moving rapidly on to the rise of the eighth king. You may read of how his spirit is at work in both America and the rest of the world by following this link http://www.hudson.org/files/publications/SaudiPropoganda.pdf

We are told that the eighth king mentioned in Rev. 17:11 is actually the entire beast described as “the beast that was, and is not.” We are told that most of the whole world will be filled with wonder when they behold the beast that was, and is not, and yet is. We are told that only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s Book of Life will be able to escape his allure. While no one should have a problem escaping this deceiver because the Bible give us so much information about him, the only way anyone can avoid falling into his traps is by actually believing the Bible. Alluring God’s people into the traps of the Dragon is what the Whore of Babylon is all about.

We are told in Rev. 13:2 that the kingdom of these ten kings looks like a leopard in overall appearance. In Daniel’s night vision in Dan. 7:6 the leopard represented the Grecian Empire. The Eighth chapter of Daniel provides the vision and prophecy about an Empire that nearly every Biblical Commentator that has ever written on Daniel has agreed should be applied to the Grecian Empire of Alexander the Great, and to the four divisions of his kingdom that followed, and most have stated that verses 23-25 apply to Antiochus Epiphanes whom the Jews called Epimanes. But there are some really big problems with that understanding. Verse 8:19 in that prophecy says “…I will make thee know what shall be in the last end of the indignation: for at the time appointed the end shall be.” This is one of the few Biblical Prophecies where God reveals to the prophet what he intends for him to understand about the vision, and the angel definitely told Daniel that the prophecy included the time of the end of the age. While the Gabriel did tell Daniel that the image of the Ram represented Media and Persia, and the goat represented Grecia, he also told him that the four horns of the goat represented the four divisions of the Grecian Empire, and in verses 22 through 26 Gabriel said that a king of fierce countenance would come from within those four kingdoms. While Antiochus was certainly a king of fierce countenance, and he did take control of one of the four divisions of the Grecian Empire, there are problems that prevent these verses from being applied to him. First, Antiochus came to power in the 190-80’s B. C. so it cannot be said of him that he is going to to stand up at the end of the age. Since there have been many transgressors since Antiochus, neither can it be said of his time that the transgressors had come to the full when he was in power.

So it seems fair to say that if we are intended to understand that this king represents Antiochus Epiphanes we should also be expected to understand that there have been no transgressors since then. Likewise, it cannot be said of Antiochus Epiphanes that he was broken without hand, i.e. by supernatural means. Daniel 8:23 & 24 say that this king will understand dark sentences and be mighty but not in his own power. Those verses indicate that this king of fierce countenance will understand demonic concepts and have supernatural knowledge and power, none of which can be truly said of Antiochus Epiphanes. And the final strike against understanding that this passage applies to Antiochus is that this king is going to stand up against the Prince of Princes, i.e. he is going to make war with the King of Kings and be destroyed without hand, that is to say supernaturally. Taken in total this king of fierce countenance can only be said to be the Antichrist of Daniel 9:27, Dan. 7:8 & 21, Dan. 11:21-45, Rev. 13:2-8, and Rev. 13:11-18.

In Daniel 8:21-25, when Gabriel explained Daniel’s vision to him, he told him, “the rough goat is the King of Grecia.” Gabriel said that, the great horn between the eyes of the “rough goat” was the first king of Grecia. Gabriel then told Daniel that when the king who was represented by the single great horn was broken, his kingdom would be divided by four other kings. And this is what actually happened when Alexander died. His brother and his sons were murdered and four of his generals divided his kingdom among themselves after much in fighting. But the prophecy continued further and said that in the latter end of these four kingdoms, when the transgressors had come to the full, a supernaturally empowered king would arise who would destroy the mighty and the holy people. Therefore, it is evident from any plain understanding of the prophecy that the King of Grecia has to be a spiritual power whose influences over mankind will have endured within all the kingdoms in the region of the Mediterranean Sea from the time that Alexander defeated the Persians until Jesus Christ defeats the King of Grecia in the person of the Antichrist.

Combining the visions of Daniel and those of John in the Seventeenth Chapter of the Revelation then shows us that this last king is going to arise from amongst the ten kings who were going to come to power at the disintegration of Rome. John was told in Rev. 17:10-12 that the seventh king seen in his visions had not yet come into power at the time he saw the vision, but that when this seventh king did come to power he would endure but for a little while before being replaced by an eighth king. John was told that this eighth king, who was going to arise, and the beast that had existed earlier, but that did not exist at the time of John’s visions, but who was coming to power once more before going into perdition, are one and the same entities. Therefore the following facts become plain:

1) the eighth king, who is also going to be the Antichrist, cannot come from the kingdom of Rome because John was told that neither the seventh nor the eighth king were in power at the time the Roman Empire existed.

2) The eighth kingdom has to be revived from one of the first five kingdoms that John was told about that had already fallen at the time of the Revelation because John was told that the beast, who is the same as this king, had existed before the king of Rome, but did not exist at the time of the king of Rome, but would day arise again out of the bottomless pit. Therefore this eighth king has to be the resurrection of one of the first five kings and is raised specifically to wage war against God and his kingdom.

3) The five kings before Rome, who have waged war against God and his kingdom, but who were not Roman, were: Egypt, Assyria, Babylon, Medo-Persia, and Greece.

4) All eight kings are the spiritual powers in a great warfare against God and his kingdom, and the warfare they are waging has been, is now, and will continue to be manifested upon earth in the rise and fall of actual kingdoms and in the spiritual influences that have affected men within those kingdoms.

5) The little horn, who is going to arise from amongst the ten horns that have succeeded the King of Rome, is said to be identical with the beast described in Revelation 13:1-2. This can only be so if the little horn is the power that is behind all of the others kings represented by the beast. We are told that that the spiritual power behind all of these former kings is the Dragon, Satan, The Old Devil Himself. Therefore, this eighth horn that arises is the incarnation of the spiritual power who has been behind the other kings represented by the beast with seven heads and ten horns. We are told in Rev. 13:2 that this power is Satan, and his eighth king will be himself incarnate in the person of the Antichrist who is going to come to power in the last days and defeat the people of God through the use of supernatural weapons in a mighty war upon earth.

This little horn becomes great and powerful by first defeating three of the ten kings from among whom he arises.

So the eighth empire that consists of the ten kingdoms around the Mediterranean Sea is going to have the overall character of the Grecian Empire. The character of the Grecian Empire provided the Clay in the Roman Empire that would not mix with the Iron. Alexander spread the Grecian Empire over that region in order to establish a One World Empire that consisted of all the same religion, all the same money, and all the same political system. He was motivated by the belief instilled in his character by Grecian tutors that Greece was destined to rule the earth because of her superior religion, politics, and economy. The New World Order is planned for the earth for the very same reasons by the very same philosophy. This New World Order is now being implemented by a United Nations that is now exhibiting definite pro Islam and anti Israel/anti American policies.

Mohammed incorporated many of the teachings of Ancient Greece, the Hebrew Pentateuch, some of the New Testament, and the teachings of Zoroaster in the Koran. For this reason Islam has had great success in the areas around the Mediterranean Sea where those religions had been influential in the past. Islam is a particularly unifying religion when read and practiced in a general manner. But, because there are so many contradictions and errors in the Koran when taken literally, it causes wars among those who attempt to practice it to the letter. Islam is also a particularly appealing religion to those humanists who want to believe in a god and keep their faith in man, because it places the responsibility for a person’s salvation squarely upon the person himself. If it were not for the severity of Islamic traditions against women’s liberation it would be sweeping over the earth today at an even greater speed than it already is.

Because of this unifying quality, Islam is particularly appealing to the structures of the United Nations where it is now in almost complete control of the internal workings of that Organization. The following is link is a good place to begin a study of this. http://www.brusselsjournal.com/node/1224 The Islamic belief that Islam is destined to subdue the world to Allah is the rebirth of the belief of Alexander The Great that he was to create One World of religion, currency, and politics, and Islam represents the kingdom that was and is again going to be.