12:3 Then another sign appeared in heaven: an enormous red dragon with seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns on its heads.
Then ANOTHER SIGN appeared in heaven:
The woman (verse 1) was the first sign.
an ENORMOUS RED DRAGON
"Look at that", John says, "I have seen evil in my day, but seeing this makes me realize evil is much larger and pervasive than really known." Even John is taken by the "size of evil"; we just don't experience that in our everyday activities. Nonetheless, evil of that magnitude is around us all the time.
Red is the absence of peace (Revelation 6:4); so all turmoil and conflict is embodied in this SIGN (symbol).
This is an ugly creature. Many scholars believe the seven heads refers to past governmental (Revelation 17:10) periods and the ten horns to governments in the last times (Revelation 17:12). Daniel's dragon had only one head and ten horns (Daniel 7:7; Daniel 7:23-28). Since Daniel's dream was about the end times, this would make sense for Daniel's vision to only have the 10 horns.
This denotes that the evil is actively working inside governments in the end time. The devil (dragon - verse 9) openly boasts that the world's kingdoms are his (Luke 4:5-6). While Jesus didn't refute it (why should He argue with the devil?), He countered it by quoting scripture. This tells us that to counter 'the GREAT RED DRAGON', that we should quote scripture. Oh, that we would spend more time in studying God's Word.
This also implies that instead of working for the people, governments work for Satan (1 John 5:18-19-21). We wonder what the government's programs really are meant to do! A person only has to recall the Holocaust or abortion rights or alcohol misuse; all "legal" in government terms but intent on 'killing' people in violation of one of God's ten commandments (Exodus 20:13).