Daily Devotional For October 15, 2025
And the beast, who was and is not, he is an eighth, but he is one of the seven, and he will go to destruction. Rev 17:11.
This text is a monumental puzzle. First of all, the seven heads are seven mountains, then they are seven kings. Then an eighth head comes at the End but is also one of the seven heads, mountains, and kings! Not only that, all of these symbols are equivalent to the waters on which the woman also sat (Rev 17:1)! So there is much to be puzzled about in this text.
There is a practical principle in all this. The earlier kings are like the family tree or pedigree of the beast. He acts just like them. This follows a pattern that we can also recognize at the personal level. The sins of the fathers are passed on to their children. We all tend to repeat the mistakes of the past, the family history.
I once had a chance to sit down with a great psychologist on the beach. I asked him what insight he had that might make my life better. He brought up the concept of “life command-ments.” He said that everyone tends to internalize certain “laws of life” from their home situation around the ages of 9-13. These laws are as unchangeable to us as the ten commandments, no matter how silly they may seem to others. Identifying these “life commandments” and reshaping them according to God’s word will bring positive change into a person’s life.
After some discussion we identified three life commandments that governed my life in a major way. They were 1) the need to always be on time, 2) the need for fairness in all situations, and 3) a passionate dislike of dogmatism.
Now all of these seem like good things, don’t they? It is courteous to be on time and not make other people wait. The problem is that I can be pretty ugly to people who get in my way while I am trying to be on time! And often those people in my way are the ones I love the most, and they don’t deserve to be trampled by someone else’s obsession!
Being fair and rooting for the underdog are also good qualities to have. The trouble comes whenever I perceive that someone else isn’t being fair with me. While I try to extend fairness toward others, I can get pretty upset if a similar fairness is not extended in return. This has caused a lot of mishaps around my house!
Unless we act decisively with God’s help, we are all prisoners of the rules that were hammered into us in the past. So I’ve made some decisions. I consider it a courtesy to others to be on time, but not at the expense of courtesy toward my family and significant others. I choose to be as fair as possible in my dealings with others, while letting go the pain of when others have been unfair to me. I’m happy to report that I’m making progress.
Lord, open my eyes to the truth about myself, no matter what the cost.