The Book of Revelation comes with a blessing to all who read it, hear it and do what it says. The question is: How can we understand it if is presented to us in the form of symbols?
Symbols can be understood after the prophecy has been fulfilled and believers are encouraged when they look back in history and see what the symbols represented. God uses symbols to keep what He has planned a mystery before it takes place; that way neither man nor Satan can compromise it.
Revelation teaches us that God blesses overcomers, warns of judgment and tells us what will happen to those who do not listen.
In The Book of Revelation Satan uses Paganism (symbolized by the Dragon); The Antichrist (symbolized by the Beast) and False Doctrine (symbolized by the False Prophet) to stop the truth of the gospel.
The reader will learn from the Reformers what each of these systems are: how they rose to power; how their power was taken away and how they come on the scene again for a ? little season? before the Second Coming of our Lord.
