Studies in Revelation 12
David H. Linden, University Presbyterian Church,
Las Cruces, NM, February, 2013
The Book of
Revelation takes a major turn in chapter 12.
While Satan is mentioned in the messages to the churches, he has not
appeared in Revelation since John was called up to heaven in chapter 4. Now in
chapter 12 by mentioning that ancient serpent we are brought to look at the conflict from the time of the Garden of
Eden. Who are the chief opponents (or antagonists) in the battle that was
obviously underway long before the days of John? This battle will not be
concluded until chapters 19 & 20, but the sides and the venue are clearly
delineated.
A few wonderful features are manifest:
1. The frustration of the devil Setback has
met Satan in his program of countering the Lord in everything that gives glory
to God. It is tremendously encouraging to read of Satan having defeat after
defeat.
2. The protection of the Lord’s people The male child was
taken safely to heaven. The woman was safe in the wilderness no matter what the
devil tried. The paradox will unfold that the people of God are protected right
up to: a) the time the beast is allowed wholesale slaughter, b)
during such a time, and c) eternally afterwards. Chapter 12 develops the plot;
the devil will proceed to do all he can against the church. It is the only
target within his reach.
3. The battleground is this earth Satan has
not only a series of defeats but also a reduced venue for his activity. Within
chapter 12 Satan finds himself limited to earth. We are being prepared in
chapter 12 to continue the narrative and to understand the final conflict. The
war in heaven is over. The remaining conflict is here. Earth is the
battleground, and man is the prize each side seeks; one to retain in slavery,
and the other to save by the Redeemer. (Salvation is covered in other
chapters.)
4. The original divine agenda The mention
of the woman in this segment of Revelation clearly ties in with Genesis 3:15.
The faceoff is God and the devil, one worked deviously through a woman, and the
Lord will work victoriously through the woman and her divine offspring. Both Psalm
2, a messianic psalm, and Isaiah 7:14, with the virgin birth come to
fulfillment in Christ.
5. The triumph of the weak God has
chosen to work through His servants. In the prophecy of Daniel and now here, it
is especially clear that God’s loyal agents in previous battles have been His
mighty angels. But the final defeat to be handed to Satan comes through the Son
Who became a man. The Lord Jesus died in weakness (2 Corinthians 13:4), and by
His blood His weak human people, “our brothers”, conquer the devil himself despite
the fact that he is so powerful he carried a third of God’s angels with him in
his rebellion. The weapons include their oral testimony of Jesus as Lord, and
their readiness to die for Him.
12:1,2 Two signs appear. Neither description is the
real thing; there are no real dragons, and the woman was not really wrapped
with the sun. These two images, actually seen by John and truthfully recorded for
us, signify something. A sign always points to
another reality, and is designed to help us understand that reality better. The
devil is like a devouring dragon with awesome power, so to present him as the
dragon shows his vicious nature. As the ancient serpent we know he is not a
recent foe.
Then too, there was a woman/people in the eternal
agenda of God through whom the Messiah would enter the world. The virgin mother
of Christ had the distinct honor of being God’s tool to bring His saving
blessing to the nations. Yet it is still so that the woman is Israel. Those
hearing Revelation read to them would immediately recognize Joseph’s dream in
Genesis 37:9-11 with its sun, moon and eleven stars. They knew this was the
family of Jacob who had become Israel.
Christ would be the offspring of woman. By means of a woman the devil tempted our
first parents. He approached Eve, not her husband. Adam was the head of his
wife (1 Corinthians 11:3) by God’s design for those in His image. Woman has a
head; man has a head; and Christ has a head. God’s reaction to this Satanic
tactic, of circumventing Adam, was that He would bring down Satan by means of
woman. The first woman bore children, and Christ is traceable to both Adam and
his wife (Luke 3:38). Later a virgin woman gave Jesus birth when the Son of God
became man. We should not miss that it is also so that Christ came from a
nation. He is the seed or offspring of Abraham (Galatians 3:16), the Son of
David (Psalm 110:1; Isaiah 9:7), the true Israel (Isaiah 49:3), and the
virgin’s son (Isaiah 7:14).
Within Revelation this identification of Israel is
well supported. Based on the repeated use of twelve in chapters 7 & 21, v.1 signals that the woman is Israel. The Virgin
Mary was part of that nation. In most mentions of woman in Revelation 12 we
must interpret “woman” as representing the
nation or people, not an individual. Of course the male child was born to an
individual woman, but no individual can fit the picture of the majesty in v.1, the
protection of God for her in the desert (v.6), which God did for the nation delivered from Egypt, and further, her corporate offspring
in v.17. Her offspring is a vast number from every nation not limited to Israel.
It is the entire church. Thus I conclude that the woman throughout chapter 12 is
the people of God, within which there was one uniquely privileged woman chosen by God,
a virgin named Mary, to be the mother of our Lord (Acts 1:14). This fits the
interpretation in chapter 11 that the two witnesses signify the church. The
woman’s obedient offspring in v.17 is the church. Of this there is no doubt. Later
in Revelation an additional feminine image for the corporate people of God is
the bride of 19:7; 21:2,3,9.
The vision in chapter 12 begins with her in heaven,
and then gives a record of her affliction. The linking of security and
vulnerability is common to the NT. We have trials on earth. We also have a
heavenly calling (Hebrews 3:1), a heavenly citizenship (Philippians 3:20), and
a heavenly home (Ephesians 2:6, plus Revelation 13:6, to be discussed later).
When the assault on the people of God comes to a climax, it will be severe and
bloody, but brief, because the devil’s time is short.
The glory of the woman in v.1 shall be eternally
retained. Her pain was brief and worth it, as is the case with all who are the
Lord’s (John 16:19-22). The woman so hated by the dragon is so cherished by
Christ that she is His bride eternally. The dragon could not consume either of
them.
12:3 The sign that befits the devil so
appropriately is that of a devouring dragon. This shows bluntly the murderous
nature of God’s great opponent. He is not God’s opposite; there is no other who was and is and is to come. God alone is eternal. The
devil is recent, not eternal, powerful, not almighty; venturesome, but a
failure; deceitful, but his fabrication is thin and shall be exposed as false.
The heads reveal his self-professed royalty, and seven heads fit his claim of complete sovereignty, especially
when all seven heads are crowned with seven diadems. He knows his pretense is not true, and that he will soon be exposed,
stripped, removed, and punished. He parades the insignia but lacks the reality.
Rejoice that he will lose his kingdom (16:10) and his grip on all he has sought
to control. He just does not want you to know that. The ten horns fit common Biblical imagery to show strength. (See Psalm
75.)
He is also red. In the second seal, the red horse of
6:4 is the cause of much killing. The woman who drinks the blood of the saints
(17:6) is clothed in scarlet and sits on a scarlet beast (17:3,4). In
retaliation the Lord Jesus will appear as one whose garments are red with the
blood of those he has crushed in vengeance (19:13). It may be that the red color
of the dragon indicates his penchant for spilling blood.
12:4 His influence in heaven is a surprising
accomplishment and a resounding defeat. Anyone who can bring down a third of
God’s angels with him is an amazingly successful devil. Note that a third is a
minority, but it is a large minority. V.4 says he cast them down, and v.9
enlarges on this feat with a fuller explanation. If the dragon can do that, the
appearance is that he could consume the child about to be born. But this is
Revelation, where the narrative oscillates from Satan’s apparent successes to
frustration and defeat. He does not get the child, for that Child has the
divine assignment to destroy the destroyer (11:18). This verse shows Satan’s
priorities. His focused hatred is against Christ. He craved but was denied the
worship of Christ (Matthew 4:9,10), and now the apocalyptic imagery is vivid:
it was not the woman he sought to devour first but the Child. Only after being
frustrated in his prime target did he pursue the woman.
12:5 She gave
birth to a male child. The Greek is a male son! Emphasizing the gender ties
woman and son to Isaiah 7:14. “One who is to rule all the nations with
a rod of iron”
is clearly from Psalm 2. It is so close to that text that it is almost a
quotation. The dragon with seven heads to claim all the nations thought he
might consume the One Who is God’s anointed for that very purpose. That the Son
is the Anointed of the Lord in Psalm 2 is one of only two places where the OT refers
to the coming Savior as Messiah.
To be caught up to God is
certainly to be safe. To be caught up to God’s throne shows the full right of
this human Child to that throne. This is also seen in 22:1 & 22:3 where the
throne is the throne of God and of the Lamb. Earlier Revelation 5 had the heavenly
multitude cry out. “Worthy is the Lamb” (5:12) to receive a seven-fold honor; then honor is
repeated in 5:14 “To him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb be
blessing and honor and glory and might forever and ever!” There is no ambiguity about the
deity of Christ. What belongs to the One seated on the throne, also belongs to
our Lord Jesus Christ. That the Child was snatched to the throne of God is not
condescension but recognition.
He was snatched, or caught up. The Greek verb is the same as
in 1 Thessalonians 4:17, “Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught
up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air…” The verb usually indicates very
deliberate seizing. This is so in both of these texts. One aspect of the Second
Coming is that Christ appears “to save those who are eagerly waiting for him” (Hebrews
9:28).
12:6 With the main prize safely back on His
throne, the dragon goes for a secondary target, the woman. For all of chapter
12, the woman is out of his reach, not in heaven but on earth. Just as Israel
could breathe relief after their flight from the Egyptian army, the woman has a
place prepared by God. Like the original exodus, she is both safe and fed.
Israel had manna from heaven; the woman is nourished for 1260 days. The
timeframe of Daniel 7:25 appears again, just as in Revelation 11:2 & 3. In
its repetition in v.14 this woman is “nourished for a time, and times, and half a time”. In this time the nations trample the people
of God (11:2), and the witnesses proclaim the message of God (11:3). In this
same time the woman is nourished in a place prepared by God (12:6). Later in
13:5, it will include that during this same time the beast exercises his
oppressive authority. To some this may seem contradictory, but a battle does
have contrary efforts which are simultaneous. We must not confuse the
sustaining grace of God during the entire time of our persecution with the
ultimate deliverance coming only at the Second Coming. Only then will conflict
be forever over. To preach successfully while being trampled (chapter 11) and
nourished while being murdered (as in chapter 13), is one of the great paradoxes
of Revelation. God’s people are never deserted to the dragon, though they may
be so engaged that in their death they conquer. This does not contradict the
promise that the Lord is constantly with us to the very end of the age, that
is, throughout the 1260 days. The Lord did use the word always in Matthew 28:20.
Revelation does not downplay our
danger, while it uses various images to set forth our security: sealed, marked
& counted in chapter 7, measured, or marked off as inside His property line
in chapter 11, and now in chapter 12 the woman is in a place of divine care. In
chapter 13 will come our discovery that our names have always been written “in the book of life of the Lamb”.
The
Structure of Revelation 12 Verses 1-6 introduce the dragon and his
attempt to devour the loyal agents of God. Within the entire chapter the
devil’s only success is taking with him a third of God’s angels. The Lord never
tried to save them. In the remainder of the chapter we have a recapitulation and
enlargement of much that appears in 12:1-6, except Satan has no opportunity to
assault Christ directly. His only recourse is to attack those who belong to
Christ. Much more detail on that subject lies ahead. This segment returns to
the dragon who once carried on his seduction in heaven. That Revelation recapitulates
is one of the keys for interpreting the book. It should be no trouble to see
that in v.7 John goes back to a theme already addressed.
12:7-9 We now know why the devil swept a third of
the angels and cast them to the earth. He persuaded them to join him in his
attempt to take over the position of God. I pause to point out what an absolute
horror it would be for God to be replaced by the devil. I add how proper and
even wonderful for us it is that God defends His glory as God. The Lord will
not give His glory to another (Isaiah 42:8; 48:11). The Lord has His loyal
servants: Michael and his allied angels fought against the dragon. The Lord in
His infinite wisdom ordained that there should be an issue to make manifest
among the ranks of these spiritual beings whether each one truly loved the Lord
his God with all his heart. Michael’s beautiful name means “Who is like God?”
His joyful reply to his name is “no one”. That an imposter, the Serpent, dared
to have a different answer has been the essence of a great battle. The challenge
to obedience, faith, loyalty, faithfulness, etc. began before man was ever
created. The sides, for or against, have been settled for every intelligent
being except man. To whom shall man’s allegiance be given? Our salvation
requires that we confess that “Jesus is Lord” (Romans 10:9). Satan is
relentless that man may have any other lord but Christ.
The Battle of Heaven is over. The
Battle of Earth will take center stage and hold it hereafter. To grasp the
magnitude of the battle we need to know that it was not limited to the sphere
in which we live. It began with a rogue angel, and has enveloped mankind from
the days of our first parents. It has not ended yet. The dragon was thrown down
and all who followed him. That pattern will follow on earth.
That there was no longer any
place for them in
heaven (v.8, also v.14) is the opposite of God providing a place for the woman (v.6). To have a
place or to be denied a place is important imagery in Revelation. In the
Judgment Day the scene is so daunting the earth and sky cannot flee, there was
no place for them (20:11). Not just in heaven but also on earth, the harassed woman
(i.e., the people of God) has a place provided for her. The wicked spirits may
be held in the abyss (9:1-11), or they may wander through waterless places
seeking rest; they find none (Matthew 12:43). They are homeless, because they
gave up their original place (Jude 6). They have no place except the gloom of
utter darkness forever (Jude 13).
V.3 says the dragon cast down
these stars (angels), but v.9 says he and they were thrown down. V.3 speaks of
the effect Satan has had on those who sided with him. He cast them down in the
sense that he has been defeated in heaven, and his conspiring angels share his
defeat. In that way he brought them down.
The Devil Described
V.9 is very helpful to gather choice descriptions of the devil. (See
also 20:2.) He is the devouring dragon
(1 Peter 5:8), and the deceiving serpent.
His name Satan means adversary. He is first the adversary of
God, opposing the Lord’s sovereign right as Creator to reign over His subjects.
Satan prefers himself as Lord of all. He is also the adversary of all who
remain loyal or become loyal to the Lord our God. He is the devil (diabolos in Greek) who casts
aspersions on God (Genesis 3:5), and blasphemes those who live in heaven (13:6).
He tempts people to sin, rejoices in his success, and then betrays those he has
deceived by accusing them before God. He hopes then for the consequences of sin
to fall on them. He delights in the suffering of all those he has seduced. He
loves to destroy anything that is good. He is especially frustrated and
continuously defeated when we resist him (James 4:7) by delighting in Christ
our Mediator Who shed His blood for us. At the same time we live with
forgiveness from God and temptation from the devil. He cares nothing for
forgiveness, only that those who trust him should suffer in their guilt
eternally. Completely unlike Satan, God not only forgives but cleanses (1 John
1:9), even His enemies who repent (Romans 5:10). Having no saving motive ever,
the devil relishes uncleanness and darkness. This adversary also has an
Adversary, our Lord Jesus Christ, Who shall destroy him (Hebrews 2:18). In v.10
it adds “accuser of our brothers”. Maybe at one time, Satan was assigned in his duties
as the anointed guardian cherub of Ezekiel 28:14, to bring charges against anyone
who might rebel against the Lord. This is conjecture, except that Ezekiel 28
does speak of a high position and hints at a role. It is even greater
conjecture to suppose that when he had fallen, he would still be a prosecutor.
Some accept this idea. If it was once so, then perhaps the accusations
(undoubtedly before God) were a carryover from his role in an earlier time of
loyal service. What we do know is that Satan tempts to sin AND then accuses the
sinners he deceived. Christ endured our temptation and underwent the justice a
true accusation would have brought on us. Since Christ is the reason for our
justification, He refutes every one of Satan’s accusations that he raises
against every soul joined to the Lord Jesus by faith. Satan can accuse away,
but concerning those who belong to Christ, he is wasting his breath.
In
what we are told of this warfare in heaven, it is especially significant that
there is no mention of the direct involvement of Christ. The Lord loves his
angelic and human servants. He has been pleased to assign such agents as
Michael and other angels to resist and defeat the dragon. This, of course,
shows the limitation of Satan’s success among God’s holy angels. He never won a
majority. God’s election of angels (1 Timothy 5:21) preserved them from sinning.
Satan snared only a third. The role of God’s loyal angels is not passive. They
do not just sit around twiddling holy thumbs. At times they have high and
responsible service (Daniel 10:13,21; 12:1), including service to us lowly
creatures (Hebrews 1:14; Daniel 6:22). Their service, genius, and initiative is
not independent from their Lord; it is active service in the interests of God. When
the scene changes to earth, our Lord’s human servants defeat the dragon. Quite
a surprise! That victory involves the blood of Christ. But first we need to discover
who speaks this praise of God in vv.10-12.
12:10
The loud voice in heaven is a corporate voice. Many are praising in
unison. The word voice is singular,
but the voice speaks of our God and our brothers, so this is the corporate speech of
redeemed human beings. Only humans have brothers enjoying salvation who are
freed from all accusation of sin. (There are no forgiven angels.) They praise
God that the accuser of our brothers has been thrown down. This just might be
an apocalyptic way of saying that Satan’s accusations were invalid and
ineffective, as well as unwelcome. It is disgusting to God to charge any sinner
with sins that have been forgiven. Satan’s accusations are devilish, for they
seek to countermand the Father’s gracious justification which the sinner enjoys
in Christ. Satan cannot grasp the sincerity of the Lord, or His divine joy in
forgiving. Micah 7:18 says: “Who
is a God like you, pardoning iniquity and passing over transgression for the
remnant of his inheritance? He does not retain his anger forever, because he
delights in steadfast love.” Thus we
sinners shall forever sing, “Who is a pardoning God like Thee, and Who has
grace so rich and free?”
12:10-12
The devil has been thrown down from heaven. Mighty God-serving angels
did this, led by Michael, a great prince (Daniel 12:1; Jude 9). The human voice
(v.10) is in heaven, rejoicing in the great victory by brothers on earth who
have conquered the devil by the blood of the Lamb. When believers on earth
battle the evil one, it is a matter of the weak fighting far superior strength.
This human victory has two important factors. What is seen is the persecuted
church at some point lying dead on the ground (11:7-9), because they did not
love their lives in order to preserve them. By rejecting the devil’s messiah,
they defeat him. He failed to get them to repudiate Christ in favor of the ugly
replacement. In the case of every elect person (13:8), Satan fails to get them
to deny the Lord. In the vortex of temptation, our natural weakness and
compromising character will be defended against by the intercession of Christ
(Luke 22:31,32). He will deliver us.
The
first feature of this victory is that God’s witnesses lay dead, yet it
was by their death that they defeated the dragon himself. It is embarrassing
and infuriating to Satan that these despised Christians defeated his superhuman
power. In heaven the devil had won over a large number of angels superior in
strength to us. For this he could gloat. The second feature is that the
throwing down of this accusing devil has behind his defeat a power not seen by
the eye. It is the salvation and the
power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of His Christ (v.10).
Here lies the strength that enables the weak to frustrate the proud wicked
angel. In all of history, Satan has had a string of victories until the forty
days he met Jesus in the desert. There was one man on earth he could not break
(Matthew 4:1-11). Salvation, might, divine prerogative, and wise ruling all
combine in Christ.
There
follows now one of the central statements of Revelation. “And
they have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony,
for they loved not their lives even unto death” (12:11). We have seen before in
Scripture that there are saints of God who did not love their loves, but laid
them down for Christ willingly. (See Hebrews 11.) Conquering by faithfulness to
God’s Word is not a new doctrine in the Bible. Paul tore down false arguments
(2 Corinthians 10:3,4). He said the Word of God is not bound (2 Timothy 2:9). God’s
word brings a fruitful result (Isaiah 55:10,11). In Jeremiah 23:29, God’s Word was
like a hammer breaking the rock to pieces. So this was a well-developed truth made
clear in previous Scriptures, but conquering by the blood of the Lamb is a new revelation
of God’s agenda. In some remarkable way we are to join the blood of the Lamb with
the death of His martyrs.
In
chapter 11 the open scroll includes explicit new revelation sealed from the
time of Daniel. This new material is very closely tied to the revelation that
the nations will repent and glorify the God of heaven (11:13). This rapid and
worldwide conversion is directly linked to the death, resurrection, and
ascension of the witnessing church. We would naturally expect at this point that
reference would be made to the death, resurrection, and ascension of Christ,
since that is the foundation of salvation. This fusion of events, a fusion of
two distinctly different sacrifices, indicates that the death and vindication
of believers is a tool in the hands of God to bring about the conversion of the
nations. In chapter 11, we have the conversion event; in chapter 12 we find an
explanation, namely that this conquering of the devil by our brothers is by the
blood of the Lamb. The challenge before us is what that statement means.
I
must interject at this point to reaffirm that the sacrifice of Christ is atoning,
reconciling, propitiatory, redeeming, delivering, substitutionary, and is as
well the conquest of Satan. Since we face the same foe, one (and only one) of
the functions just listed is replicated in us. Ours too is a death that
conquers by the voluntary giving up of our lives.
Naturally
the two witnesses in chapter 11 preached the gospel. No gospel preaching omits
the blood of the Lamb. Christ is the One Who “loves
us and has freed us from our sins by his blood” (1:5). Preaching alone throughout
the 1260 days did not produce the sudden conversion shown in 11:13. Revelation
is showing that when the truth of the God of heaven is combined with the death
of those who did not love their lives, that God has chosen to use our death as
a means to snatch the nations from Satan. No longer will the world be able to
say, “Who is like the beast and who
can fight against it?”
(13:4), for the simple reason that the God of heaven will reverse all that the
beast does to His saints. Suddenly it will become exceedingly clear Who can
make war with the beast. All this happens before the watching eyes of the
nations. In 11:9,10 the observers of these deaths and God’s reaction are the
people of this planet. God has acted in a very public way.
Our
deaths cannot be an atoning death for sin. Only the blood of the Lamb removes
sin. The question now is what will produce repentance. When God produces
repentance upon the display of His power (12:10), He has at hand our unyielding
refusal to worship the beast. In other words, He has added the testimonial blood of His people to the atoning blood of Christ. The Lord Jesus
bore His unique cross, and we take up ours as instruments for the salvation of
our neighbors. The blood of the Lamb on Calvary is the basis of salvation. The
blood of His dead saints is the setting for God to vindicate them and thereby broadcast
His power. By it God smashes the glory of the idolatrous beast. This is like
the showdown on Mount Carmel, when the prophets of Baal cried to a false god to
consume their sacrifice. That day the God of Elijah was shown to be the true
God. In 1 Kings 18, Elijah prayed “that this people may know that you, O
Lord, are God.”
The people fell on their faces and confessed, “The Lord, he is God…” That
scene is a small foretaste of conquering the devil by the blood of the Lamb at
the end of the age.
Previous
Scriptures Before the churches of our Lord ever had the
Book of Revelation, Scriptures already in their possession joined the sacrifice
of Christ and the death of His saints. This is not a new doctrine. The
following texts show this:
·
“The cup that I drink you will drink …” (Mark 10:39).
·
“… I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in
my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in Christ's afflictions for the sake
of his body, that is, the church…” (Colossians
1:24).
·
"The Son of Man must suffer many things and … be killed, and on the third day be raised…if
anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily
and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses
his life for my sake will save it” (Luke 9:23,24).
·
“Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after
me cannot be my disciple” (Luke 14:27).
·
“For as we share abundantly in Christ's sufferings,
so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too” (2 Corinthians 1:5).
·
“… always carrying in the body the death of Jesus,
so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies. For we who live
are always being given over to death for Jesus' sake, so that the life of Jesus
also may be manifested in our mortal flesh (2 Corinthians 4:10,11).
·
“… The hour has come for the Son of Man to be
glorified. Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the
earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. Whoever
loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will keep it
for eternal life. If anyone serves me, he must follow me; and where I am, there
will my servant be also. If anyone serves me, the Father will honor him” (John
12:23-26).
I
must repeat that I am saying that the unique and unrepeatable sacrifice of
Christ is the only atoning sacrifice (Hebrews 9:25-28). The death of His many
saints is joined to it as testimonial and is made by God to be very fruitful.
What Revelation opens to us is that those washed in the blood of the Lamb show
more than the saving benefit of the Lamb’s blood in their own salvation. God
uses their death to seize the attention of the world to His quick response to
their murder. By means of their widespread death, the Lord shows His truth
(they testified), His salvation of His saints (by making them stand up), and
the falseness of Satan’s deception. By it (and that is the key), God induces
godly fear, bringing the “rest” of mankind to an arresting fear to give glory
to the God of heaven (11:13). 12:10-12 shows that this strategy of God was
known in heaven; the redeemed there rejoiced to see the devil conquered by such
a means as the loyal death of their fellow saints still on earth. That praise anticipates
what is coming. The saints in heaven know this because “The
Lord GOD does nothing without revealing his secret to his servants the
prophets” (Amos
3:7). Before all the seals were broken open, we know of the deaths of our
brothers. And now that we have the scroll fully opened by Christ, we have
knowledge of God’s strategy. The Son received the scroll from the Father (1:1)
and He the Son declared His policy: “… All that I have heard from my Father I
have made known to you” (John
15:15).
We
must always treat such a holy thing as the blood of the Lamb with humility and
judicious caution. Between the death of Christ and ours there stretches an infinite
gap when it comes to satisfying divine justice. His was the substitutionary death
of the only Mediator between God and man (1 Timothy 2:5). When it comes to
producing the fruit of His passion, then we do share His sufferings
(Philippians 3:10). Ours is a participatory fellowship. This is beyond having
truth and agreeing with it, and even beyond disseminating it. Since it is a
working together of God and His human agents (2Corinthians 6:1) in the preaching, and the sharing of His
suffering (2 Corinthians 1:5), we have a bonding with Christ that is more than
an abstract principle. The atonement was fully accomplished apart from
our participation at the cross. Since then that atonement is being graciously applied
by the Lord, Who has chosen to employ the suffering and the blood of His
saints.
Revelation
5 and the Opening of the Scroll In chapter 5 we find a close connection
between the sacrifice of the Lamb on one side and His worthiness to open the sealed
scroll on the other. This is not a coincidence where two subjects happen to
appear in the same context. Not at all, for they are explicitly linked. This makes
it appropriate to expect that the sacrifice of the Lamb slain has some bearing
on the message within that sealed scroll. I think that what emerges is the that
His conquering by His death means He is worthy to open the scroll, and this
scroll will reveal that His saints will conquer by their death, with the result that the dragon and beast are
conquered. Observe the connection:
V.5
The Lion has conquered, so that He
can open the scroll. It does not give as a reason that He can open the scroll,
because He is the Son of God. There is a stated reason why His conquering gives
Him a specific right to do so. This is repeated in v.9, “Worthy are you to take the scroll and to
open its seals [why?], for you were
slain…” In the
texts which appear after the messages to the seven churches, we find that
conquering usually involves killing, or in the case of the Lord’s people, it is
conquering by being killed. Note the way this verb is used throughout Revelation:
·
Faithful saints conquer by obedience, always in the
face of duress (chapters 2 & 3).
·
The rider on the white horse conquers by killing
(6:2).
·
The beast conquers the saints by killing them
(11:7).
·
The saints, loving not their own lives, conquer by
the blood of the Lamb (12:11), choosing death over the horror of false worship.
·
The beast makes war on the saints and conquers them
(13:7); that means he kills them (13:15).
·
By refusing to worship the beast and dying because
of it, the saints conquered the beast (15:2).
·
Christ conquers the wicked kings in 17:14. Since
this was in response to them making war on the Lamb, it is simple to conclude
that in wrath He killed them (6:16).
·
In the end of the book, the one who conquers
inherits. The earlier use of this word makes it clear that these saints conquered
by rejecting the worship of the beast (21:7). Their deaths were precious, and
their end was glorious.
In
chapter 5 the Lamb’s worthiness to open the scroll is that He was slain, and
thereby He ransomed people for God (5:9). The scope of the ransomed people is
from every tribe, language, people, and nation. The paradox is that the beast
had authority over every tribe, people, language and nation (13:7), and in that
bondage a multitude from the peoples, tribes, languages and nations rejoiced at
the death of the witnesses (11:9). After a mere remnant of the wicked were
slain in divine judgment (7000), “the rest” had fear and gave glory to the God
of heaven (11:13). The precious death of His saints (Psalm 116:15) is combined in
Revelation with the precious blood of the Lamb (1 Peter 1:19) to bring
salvation to the nations. The scroll declares the effectiveness of the death of
His saints, and that it would be the key tool at the end of the age by which
God will take back man to be His again. The opened scroll reveals God’s strategy.
We overcome by the blood of the Lamb, when we willingly carry in our bodies the
death of Jesus, being given over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that the life of
Jesus may be manifested in our mortal flesh (2 Corinthians 4:10,11). The result
of this privilege is the conversion of the ones ransomed by the blood of Christ
from every nation, people, language and tribe.
For
all this, the saints in heaven rejoice (12:12). From heaven Satan has been cast
down to earth. This means the war between God and the devil will be waged to
its bloody end right here where we live. Satan is a very frustrated devil.
Chapter 12 shows a string of defeats. His time is short, and his wrath is
great. There is only one avenue of attack left to him. In some way he will
attack the saints on earth.
13-16
The encouraging word here is seen in this pattern: the dragon pursued,
but the woman was given … the serpent
poured, but the earth came to the help of …
Revelation 12 is a message that speaks of the loyalist vs. rebel
conflict from inception to resolution. In heaven it is over. The final battle scene
is earth. Later it is spoken of as “the
battle” (16:14; 19:19; 20:8).[1] We must not miss that the devil is losing;
his kingdom is crumbling. He knows his time is short. He is frustrated and
angry (12:17). If we think he is in real control, we buy into his propaganda.
Coming from him, any scenario is automatically false. The truth is: he is
losing.
He
could not consume the woman. The woman of v.13 has been Israel. The ancient
covenant people when delivered from Egypt were safe in the wilderness from the army
that drowned in the Red Sea. Note the
security in the Lord’s words describing the Exodus: “You yourselves have seen
what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles' wings and brought
you to myself”
(Exodus 19:4). Jews hearing Revelation for the first time would connect the
words of 12:14 to that deliverance. There the woman is cared for, just as God
fed the Israelites with manna in the desert (Deuteronomy 8:16). She would be
nourished during the entire time identified as the 3½ years. [There will be an Appendix 12A concerning this timeframe in
Revelation and Daniel.] The woman, seen more clearly later, as the people of
God, is maintained during the entire time. During this time the nations
trample, and the witnesses prophesy (11:2,3), and the people of God are
maintained until the prophetic testimony is complete (11:7). God’s restraint of
Satan should be obvious.
The
devil’s modified strategy is to drown the woman he was not allowed to destroy directly. From his mouth comes a river to sweep her
away. But those God has deigned to protect will indeed be protected. If
anything comes from the serpent’s mouth, it will be deceit. Note that the
imagery changed from dragon to serpent.
The ancient serpent is the deceiver of the whole world (12:9). As “the father
of lies” deception is his very nature (John 8:44). It is always part of his
strategy (2Thessalonians 2:9,10). The
true church will not believe him. Those who know not the Lord will fall for his
convincing words (Mark 13:22). The beautiful hymn has it right:
The Church shall never perish! Her dear Lord to
defend,
To guide, sustain, and cherish, Is with her to the end:
Though there be those who hate her, And false sons in her pale,
Against both foe or traitor She ever shall prevail.
Though with a scornful wonder Men see her sore
oppressed,
By schisms rent asunder, By heresies distressed:
Yet saints their watch are keeping, Their cry goes up, “How long?”
And soon the night of weeping Shall be the morn of song!
The
imagery of a personified earth in v.16 is Revelation’s vivid way to show yet
another defeat for Satan. His lies do not work. That means his standard tool is
ineffective with the church. No one joined to Christ, and therefore indwelt by
the Spirit, and having the words of God in the heart will accept Satan’s error.
So he has another strategy, one spelled out in chapter 13. It will be a display
to the eyes, composed of false wonders and the coercion of the sword. This time
his efforts through the beast and the false prophet will have every appearance
of being a great success, but by this time in the reading of Revelation, we
should expect it to fail.
12:17
The woman up to this point stands in the tradition of Israel. The
imagery of protection refers to Israel’s exodus from Egypt. But what appears in
v.17 is not another woman, but her offspring. It must be Israel’s offspring.
Isaiah 54 predicts that Israel would be unable to bear children. Her chances compare
to the ability of a barren widow – no offspring expected there. But Isaiah 54
predicts God’s almighty intervention that her children will be so many they possess
the cities of the nations. Isaiah 54:7-9 makes a promise which cannot be
applied to Israel in its unbelief and rejection of the Lord Jesus at His first
coming. Thus the woman in Isaiah, just like Revelation 12, is the church. The
rest of her offspring includes “those who
keep the commandments of God”. This cannot apply to anyone in unbelief who
rejects Christ, because Revelation 12:17 becomes even more explicit. The
offspring “hold to the testimony of
Jesus”. The description of the woman’s offspring fits the church. No
Gentile believer hearing v.17 would conclude that this excluded him. The words
describe every believer.
Revelation
12 ends without telling us that this specific Satanic agenda will fail. Of
course it will, but we are at the point where what Revelation said so briefly
of the killing beast in 11:7, will be expanded in chapter 13. The dragon stood
on the sand of the sea from which the beast will emerge (13:1).
[1] The definite article “the” is present in Greek in all three of these verses, but it is
omitted each time in the ESV. The NIV includes the article in 16:14, but not in
19:19 or 20:8. The Greek noun for war
or battle appears in Revelation nine
times. The first six have no article, which tends to make the last three with
the article more significant. I say the last three point to the same event, the
last battle of all.