Chapter Twenty-Eight/Contending With Two Ferocious Beasts - Continue

 Is it not shocking to identify the ruling political powers with a wild beast? That is what some opposers claimed during World War II, when the status of Jehovah's Witnesses, as an organization and as individuals, was being challenged in law courts around the earth. But stop and think! Do not the nations themselves adopt beasts or wild creatures as their national symbols? For example, there are the British lion, the American eagle, the Chinese dragon, and the Russian bear. So why should anyone object if the divine authority of the Holy Bible also uses beasts to symbolize world powers? 

Moreover, why should anyone object to the Bible's saying that it is Satan who gives the wild beast its great authority? God is the Source of that statement, and before him, 'the nations are a drop from a bucket as film of dust.' Those nations would do better to court Gods favor than to take offense at the way his prophetic Word describes them. (Isaiah 40:15, 17; Psalm 2:10-12) Satan is no mythical person assigned to tormenting departed souls in a fiery hell. No such place exists. Rather, Satan is described in Scripture as "an angel of light"-a master deception who exercises powerful influence in general political affairs. - 2 CORINTHIANS 11:3, 14, 15; EPHESIANS 6:11-18.

Next time: Chapter Twenty-Eight/Contending With Two Ferocious Beasts - Continue

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