666: man in opposition to God

The irony of all of this is that, for all the fanciful interpretations that have been given, it is not really that hard. The text itself tells us what the number 666 means. It tells us that in Revelation 13:18, when it says, for it is the number of a man (or better: the number of man). That is what it means. It is the number of man. Six by itself is the number of man apart from Jehovah God. Six is one short of the number of the covenant of God and man together, which is the number seven. Six is the number of men who are, therefore, not in covenant with Jehovah God. Those who come short of that covenant. There are six days in the week of creation, but the full week is not expressed in six, but in the number seven. That week includes the seventh day – the day of the covenant of God and man – where God’s people experience that covenant and enter into fellowship with God on that day. Where they are called to worship and meet with their God face-to-face. Where the covenant is renewed publicly. On the seventh day, the normal tasks of the other six were put aside to bask fully in what that number seven represented: The covenant between God and His people, God and His church together in communion. And six is short of that! Six represents man in this life without that seventh day, without that covenant. It is man pursuing all the things that man pursues, but without God, apart from God, without seven, without the covenant.

The number of the beast is the number of man (six) repeated three times: 666. It is an unholy trinity of man, in opposition to the Trinity of God. It is man, and then more man, and then more man, never arriving at God and His covenant. The number of the beast, then, is man apart from God, developed as fully as he can possibly be developed. It is man developing this creation, it is man progressing, it is man achieving to his highest point, to his climax, all apart from God! Apart from the covenant of grace. Against God, for the glory of man and not God. It is the number of man. It is Humanism with a capital H. Man in full opposition to God’s revealed will.

How then are you going to identify the Antichrist and his kingdom? It is not going to be by the emails that get sent around some times that say, If you add this and this and put this here, it forms 666. This is how you will identify the Antichrist and his kingdom: It is given over to the glory of man in opposition to Jehovah God. It will speak what unregenerate man in his depraved nature wants to hear, whether it speaks that in the name of Jesus Christ or not. It will lift man above God in every respect in the theologizing of its false and apostatizing church and the blasphemy that comes out of its mouth. In its media, its music and its movies, its message will be the message of man apart from God. Man cut off from God. Man seeking to set himself up as God. Man serving man.

Remember that this number is also the beast’s name. Names in Scripture not only identify, but they reveal the character of someone. The names of Jesus don’t just identify for us who Jesus is as opposed to somebody else, but it reveals the character of who Jesus is. It tells us who His essence is. Well, this name of the beast reveals the character of this kingdom and of its head. It is against God and for man. It is man, man, man! This ties in with everything that we have observed already from 2 Thessalonians 2:1–17 and the other part of Revelation 13:1–18. This Antichrist in 2 Thessalonians 2:1–17 is called the wicked one, the lawless one, the man of sin and the son of perdition. His kingdom is the full flowering of man’s depraved heart in separation from God. The number 666 is not a physical identifying marker; it is a spiritual identifying marker. You see him and you see his kingdom when you see this world uniting, working for the glory of man.¹

Cory Griess