5/28/06 - “GOD’S TEST OF LOYALTY” Part 9 22L - FM
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Hello!  This is Richard Vaughn

Today we will continue our series titled, “GOD’S TEST OF LOYALTY” and today’s segment will be Part 9. Before we begin, let us seek God’s guidance, “Heavenly Father, we have identified in your word antichrist beast who will be the source of the mark that will cause those who receive it, to be lost. Father, most Christians aren’t aware that Satan has almost the whole world confused on this issue, even those listening today. So again we ask for the guidance of the Holy Spirit and we pray for wisdom, knowledge and understanding so that we may live in the center of Your revealed will, as we ask in Jesus Name, Amen.”
Right now, I continue to keep my pledge, to cry aloud and spare not, to lift up my voice like a trumpet and to show God’s people where they are transgressing God’s law.
Over last 9 weeks, I have stated that the first beast of Revelation 13 and the little horn power in Daniel 7 is the same antichrist beast power, the Papacy. Last week I completed the 12 points of identification from Revelation 13 and here they are in summary:
Point #1. It comes up into power in existing nations.
Point #2. It is geographically located in Rome. 
Point #3. It is a corrupt church government. 
Point #4. This religio-political power is a blaspheming power. 
Point #5. Papal Rome receives its power and authority from Satan,
Point #6. Papacy receives a deadly wound.
Point #7. The deadly wound is healed.
Point #8. The whole world wonders after or worships the Papacy.
  	Point #9. Ruled for 1,260 years.
Point #10. It will persecute God’s people.
Point #11. Has power over all nations.
	Point #12. The number of the Papacy is 666.
Now that we have clearly identified the little horn power of Daniel chapter 7, as being the same antichrist power as the first beast of Revelation 13, and since we showed 12 points of identification in Daniel and 12 points of identification in Revelation, now we can identify the mark of the beast. Understand now that you can never identify the mark without knowing who the beast is.
We will now read the most fearful warning in the entire Bible. Revelation 14:9-11 “And the third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand, the same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of His indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb:  and the smoke of their torment ascended up forever and ever:  and they have no rest day or night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name.”  
God would not make such a warning as this in the Bible unless He also made this truth very easy to understand.
      It’s truly a life or death matter.  When Jesus comes there are going to be two kinds of people on the earth—the righteous and the wicked—those who are ready and have the Seal of God and are saved for eternity those who have the Mark of the Beast and are lost for eternity.
Brothers and sisters in Jesus, you don’t want this mark because everyone who receives it will not only be lost, but they will suffer the seven last plagues, poured out from the cup of God’s wrath and it will not be mixed with mercy and grace. The age of God’s grace will then be over. 
The only thing that will cause us to be lost, the only thing that will take us to hell-fire, is unconfessed and unforsaken sin.   Here’s our first important point.  Unconfessed and unforsaken sin is the only thing that is going to cause us to be lost, and sin is the willful transgression of God's law.  So if the devil is going to trip people up with the Mark of the Beast, he will have to do it by leading millions to sin against God, and that means to cause them somewhere to transgress the eternal moral law of God. 
To take the Mark of the Beast will be a serious sin against God Himself!  Millions of people will be deceived, not because the truth was difficult to find out, but because they did not receive the love of the truth. (2 Thessalonians 2:10).   They didn't appreciate and embrace the beauty of the truth when they saw it but rather tried to reason excuses to get around having to obey it.

 James 2:10 says,
 “For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in (how many?) one point, he is guilty of all.  For he that said, Do not commit adultery, said also, Do not kill.” 
Now what law is he quoting from here?  The ten-commandment law.  James says, “Now, if thou commit no adultery, yet if thou kill, thou art become (what?) a transgressor of the law.  (You'll notice it's a law singular.  If you throw a rock through a window, you didn't just break part of the window—you broke the window, right? It's one law!)   So speak ye, and so do, as they that shall be judged by the law of liberty.” 
It’s amazing that millions of professed Christians today, not only Catholics, but Protestants as well, break God’s law willfully and deliberately, and they don’t ask for forgiveness, they don’t repent, and they’ll tell you, “I just don’t think it matters!”  
	Rev.14:9  The Mark is received in the forehead or in his hand.  Now some Bibles say "on" the forehead or "on" the hand.  Now is there a difference between "in" and "on"?  There is!  There is a huge difference.
	The next point is that the Mark of the Beast is something that goes in the forehead and in the hand. 
Hebrews 10:16
“This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, saith the Lord, I will put my laws into their hearts (our innermost feelings and emotions, our desires), and in their (what?) minds will I write them;”
To review so far we know that the Mark of the Beast is some deceptive point that the devil, working through the Beast, will put into the minds and into the actions of the majority of mankind.  This deceptive Mark is going to be somewhere against the Word of God because God wants His Word to be in the forehead.  It's going to be against the law of God because God wants His law in the New Covenant to be in our foreheads or minds.
It is something that goes against the Creator, because we've read in Revelation that those who truly worship the One who made "heaven and earth, the sea and everything in it", will not get the Mark.  

To know what the Beast's mark is important. However, a more important subject is to know what God's mark is.  The reason there are so many fanciful interpretations of what the Beast's mark is; the reason why so many cannot seem to get a handle on the Beast's mark, is that they've never found out what God's mark is! If I have the Seal of God in my forehead, I don’t have to worry about the Mark of the Beast.  
But I only know of one Christian Church today that’s clearly preaching about the Seal of God.  Why is that?  You’re going to find out the reason why you don't hear many preachers talking about the Seal of God.  However it's crucial that we have this seal because if we don’t have the Seal of God, we'll be lost when Jesus comes.
	After we establish what the Seal of God is, then we’ll identify the Mark of the Beast and continue in that more.  
Revelation 7:1-3.
“And after these things I saw four angels standing on the four corners of the earth, holding the four winds of the earth, that the wind should not blow on the earth, nor on the sea, nor on any tree.  
And I saw another angel ascending from the east, having the seal of the living God: and he cried with a loud voice to the four angels, to whom it was given to hurt the earth and the sea,  
Saying, Hurt not the earth, neither the sea, nor the trees, till we have sealed the servants of our God in their foreheads.”
 Notice, “till we have sealed the servants of our God in their foreheads”  What do you have in your foreheads?  Your reason and judgment center.  The frontal lobes of your brain.  Where is the seal placed?  The seal is placed in the forehead.  What else is placed in the forehead?  God's Law! 
Is there a connection between the seal of God and the law of God?  After all, what is a seal?  A seal is an emblem or a stamp of authority.  A seal is an important stamp that is placed upon an important document by somebody who has authority.   Laws have seals to show that there is power and authority to back up that law.  

A seal's purpose is to show that there is authority behind the document.  How many have ever had a document notarized?  That’s to have a stamp or seal of authority.

Since a seal denotes authority, we ask, what is the basis of God’s authority?  Why is the Lord worthy of our worship, and hence why does He have authority?  What gives Him authority to give us commandments in the first place? Now what is the basis of the authority of God that would give Him the Seal—the Seal of the Living God?
 Revelation 4:11, “Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honour and power: for (or because), thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created.”
God receives glory and worship as the Creator of all things!  Therefore, since God is the Supreme Creator of all, and therefore has all authority, the Lord's  seal will speak of Him or point to Him as the Creator.
And because He is the Creator of the universe and has all authority, God too has a seal of that authority.    How and where does God show us His seal?  Seals are placed on documents.
Did the God of heaven ever write a document with His own hand and declare it to the human family?
God's legal document is His law—It's the one He wrote with His own finger on stone.   The One the world knows as the Ten Commandments.
Since time is up, we will examine God’s Ten Commandments in our next broadcast and see if we can find God’s seal.

So Next week “God’s Test of Loyalty” - part 10.
God bless you friends and study your Bibles daily,

Until next week, Jesus said in John 5:39, “Search the Scriptures, for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me”. Even so, Come Lord Jesus.