Babylon: Great City Judged (part 2)

Chapters 17 and 18 are an explanation of specific details describing God's full wrath being poured out on Babylon - the city and the kingdom. Last week we saw the basic vision of the harlot, Babylon (17:1-6). Today's message presents the explanation of the vision, a disclosure of the beast and the woman (17:7-18). The woman is shown sitting upon a scarlet beast that is full of blasphemous names and who has seven heads and ten horns. This picture reveals the beast as seven historical empires (17:9-10) and having ten current kings who will work simultaneously with the beast in the last days (17:12). The woman is extremely wealthy (18:16-17) and extremely immoral (18:3). She has hated the people of God, being unrestrained in her slaughter and aggressively killing them for centuries (17:6; 18:24). The beast and his ten horns will hate the woman, and work to destroy her. Then the ten horns will have a common purpose by giving their authority to the beast until Christ destroys him and them.