Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Never ask a woman if she's pregnant.
[00:00:04] I learned this lesson early on in ministry, and I cannot recount how.
[00:00:11] And I remember Pastor David Prince and my wife saying, never ask that question. Never.
[00:00:18] And I remember initially responding out of pride and saying, but, you know, no, never.
[00:00:25] You never ask that question.
[00:00:29] If a woman wants you to know if she's pregnant, she will tell you.
[00:00:33] Just don't ask it.
[00:00:35] And I'm now learning because we have a lot of pregnant ladies here at our church to stop asking another question of women who are pregnant.
[00:00:48] And it's, how are you doing?
[00:00:51] That never goes well for me, as most interactions are awkward for me at times. And I don't really understand what's going on. Sometimes, especially with pregnant women, when I ask this question, I'm really just trying to be polite.
[00:01:10] Most often, I don't need to hear a lot of details about how you're doing.
[00:01:15] Just fine would be okay.
[00:01:18] And yet I've pressed that question further when I realized that you're not fine.
[00:01:26] And I will ask, are you sure?
[00:01:29] And the response is, well, actually, I'm pretty miserable.
[00:01:34] I mean, after all, I have a human growing inside of me.
[00:01:38] And again, I'm just trying to be polite. And I've responded before, well, you look great.
[00:01:45] To see pregnant ladies just start weeping, I do not look great. Why would you say that? And the interaction is always awkward and weird. So. So I will not ask you any longer. How are you doing?
[00:01:59] I won't. It's just weird and awkward.
[00:02:02] But this makes sense biblically, because when we open up our Bibles and we see the story of redemption and we see the story of promise that God is bringing life into a world that is cursed with death, we see that the womb becomes a place of warfare.
[00:02:24] The womb is a war zone.
[00:02:28] The womb pregnancy displays power amidst even great weakness.
[00:02:38] In one person, in one scene.
[00:02:44] Pregnancy displays beauty and tragedy, joy and pain.
[00:02:50] And it is because there is a warfare that surrounds the womb.
[00:02:57] God is bringing life into a world cursed by death.
[00:03:03] This is what we read in Genesis 3, that it is through pain that there will be childbearing. It will be difficult to bring life into a world that. That is cursed by death.
[00:03:18] And he goes back to Genesis 3:15, where the promise of God first comes into the world. In this story of redemption, where it all begins. After the world is cursed by sin and death, through the work of Satan, God promises satan, I will put enmity between you and the woman, between your offspring and her offspring, and he shall bruise your head, and you shall Bruise his heel. There is a promise of the gospel from the very beginning. Sin and death has come into the world. And God declares promises to the serpent that the seed of woman will crush him. In doing so, he will be bruised, but he will be raised in victory. And. And ever since that moment in the garden, ever since those syllables were uttered from heaven, Satan, the serpent has raged.
[00:04:22] He's raged against life and he's raged against the womb that brings life into the world to stop the promise. And again, it is this story of beauty and power and joy and pain from the beginning of the Bible to the end and to the chapter that we just read in Revelation 12.
[00:04:44] You see, Revelation 12 unfolds the story of redemption from beginning to end.
[00:04:52] And we have stopped kind of in the book of revelation. Chapter 12 is the midpoint.
[00:04:59] It is where the writer, John stops. And he says, okay, we're halfway through. I, I want to show you now to the church where you fit in this story.
[00:05:10] And this is the climax of the book. This is the centerpiece of the book. He wants to recount the whole story of redemption so that the church can see you still exist in this story of enmity.
[00:05:24] The serpent hates life, and he hates the life that the gospel is bringing into the world because it conceals his doom.
[00:05:33] And as we move through chapter 12 here, one thing that we, we need to know from the beginning, as is the woman represented in this chapter.
[00:05:42] She represents the people of God at every stage in redemptive history.
[00:05:49] Don't focus on this woman as one woman. This isn't just Eve. This isn't just Israel. This isn't just Mary.
[00:05:58] This is the people of God from the beginning to the end of redemptive history, who have the promise of God. And what John does here is he displays this war zone. He displays this fight between the woman and the serpent that God promised from the beginning. And he says, in this corner, we have the woman, the people of God with the promise. And in this corner, we have the serpent, we have the dragon, we have Satan. And notice we see the promise to the woman from the beginning takes us all the way back to the book of Genesis. In verse one, notice a great sign appeared in heaven. Remember, all these things are unfolding before John, and he's seeing this cosmic battle, what Jesus is doing in the world and how it's all going to unfold. And, and here it's as if it stops and says, I'm going to take you through redemptive history from beginning to end. The woman and the serpent and the woman, from the very beginning has had the promise.
[00:07:01] Notice a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of 12 stars. How does that take us back to Genesis? Well, remember when the promise was given to Abraham, first to the serpent.
[00:07:18] You're going to be crushed. Who is this woman?
[00:07:22] Well, it's going to come from the line of Abraham.
[00:07:24] And when the promise is given to Abraham, what God tells him is your descendants will be as the stars in the heaven. That is the promise that the. The woman wears, the people of God wear in Abraham. We also see this promise in Genesis, in Joseph's dream, in chapter 37, where the sun and moon and stars are bowed before his feet. And this sun, moon, stars, they become this imagery of this king who will rule for who, the 12 tribes of Israel. Notice 12 stars. That's how Genesis ends. And so Genesis gives the promise to. To the woman, to the people of God. But notice verse 2.
[00:08:15] She was pregnant and crying out in birth pains, in agony of giving birth.
[00:08:22] So this woman has the promise. She's also pregnant with the promise. What does this symbolize? She is waiting. She is longing for the birth of this promise. But the imagery here and the terminology here of crying out takes us back to where.
[00:08:41] Egypt.
[00:08:42] When the people of God are in affliction, notice they are in agony, crying out that this seed would come, that the promise of God would come and crush Pharaoh, destroy their enemies. And they are waiting for the promise in Egypt.
[00:09:02] So we have the promise from the beginning. We have the promise in Exodus, and then we have the promise before Christ. In verse 3, notice another sign appeared in heaven.
[00:09:13] So we have the woman.
[00:09:15] Then John also sees, notice a great red dragon. Now, he uses imagery from the day, from the Romans of the day, legends of dragons.
[00:09:28] And he wants to say, there is a greater dragon than all other dragons you've ever heard of in your mythology.
[00:09:36] And it is the great red dragon from the beginning. And notice, with 7 heads and 10 horns, 7 and 10. This symbolizes fullness of power.
[00:09:47] And notice on his heads, these seven heads were seven diadems.
[00:09:54] Now, this serpent has power, as we talked about last week. He is the God of this age right now. He rules, in some sense, on the earth, creating havoc.
[00:10:06] And he is terrifying.
[00:10:08] A dragon with seven heads, a dragon with ten horns, which symbolize power and authority to destroy.
[00:10:18] John is using this imagery here to communicate.
[00:10:21] Satan, the serpent of old, is terrifying.
[00:10:26] He's terrified and he has power.
[00:10:30] And all of the imagery of the horns and the Diadems seems to point to the way in which Satan uses the evil rule on the earth to accomplish his his purposes.
[00:10:49] But behind all of these evil rulers, there is one great red dragon who is terrifying.
[00:10:56] And his goal, remember from the beginning, is to destroy the people of God, destroy the promise, destroy the woman who carries the promise. And that's what he does. In verse four, his tail swept down a third of the stars of heaven. Remember stars, Abraham's promise. The people of God that have become Israel that we see in the Old Testament, who are oppressed, they are held captive, they are exiled over and over again. And behind it all, all the evil rulers that are seeking to destroy Israel is the great red dragon. His tail is casting them out, trying to destroy them. The imagery here is being cast out of the land, cast away from God.
[00:11:50] And as we read our Old Testament from Exodus forward, we see this over and over with the people of God.
[00:11:57] We see the heads and tails of evil rulers. Think about not just the Egyptians, but the Amalekites, the Philistines, the Syrians, the Babylonians. We even read in Daniel of these beastly rulers, Nebuchadnezzar and Cyrus. We read of all of these rules that are seeking to destroy the people of God. And what John wants us to know is behind it all from the beginning is the great red dragon of fury who is seeking to destroy the people of God.
[00:12:32] And notice, we see the promise in Christ, promise from the beginning, promise in Exodus, promise before Christ. But here we, we see the promise in Christ. So he's seeking to destroy the people of God all the way through the Old Testament. And then notice verse four, and the dragon stood before the woman who was about to give birth, so that when she bore her child, he might devour.
[00:13:01] Wasn't a silent night, at least in heaven, at least in the heavenly spiritual realms, when Mary is giving birth, when Jesus is coming into the world, first of all, what do we see?
[00:13:15] Just like Pharaoh back in Egypt, where the male children are being thrown into the river, you see a Herod, an evil king, one of the heads and crowns of the serpent that there is trying to destroy the seed that is coming into the world through Christ.
[00:13:36] At the last moment, this child, the Messiah, coming into the world, he's going to devour it. We see that in the Christmas story, this evil ruler, Herod, killing babies again, the serpent wages war against the womb, because it is through the womb that God is bringing life, eternal life through the seed born of woman into the world. But notice verse 5. She gave birth it's almost abrupt, this story of warfare.
[00:14:11] Who's going to win?
[00:14:13] You have the serpent and you have the woman. Well, surely the great red dragon is going to defeat a pregnant woman, Surely a peasant woman.
[00:14:25] Surely this dragon is going to win. But she gave birth.
[00:14:33] The victory is won in this vulnerable, weak state, this peasant girl giving birth notice to a male child.
[00:14:43] Now the Romans had all of this mythology of gods who gave birth to their male children who would rule in these galaxies and control the world. And here, no, no, no. God's son, this child has come into the world. And notice what he's going to do. He is to rule all nations, including Rome, with a rod of iron.
[00:15:08] But her child was caught up to God, to his throne. Now this just sums up the life of Christ.
[00:15:14] Birth, incarnation, his obedience all the way to the cross, where he dies for sin. He is buried, but he defeats sin because he has paid for sin. And he is raised up from death and has a picture of his rule that is initiated in his first coming, where he has defeated the serpent in the gospel, he has raised and ascended. And so we have the promise in Christ, but now we have the promise in the church. Notice verse 6.
[00:15:45] And the woman fled into the wilderness. Now remember, you got to get the grid from the beginning. This is the people of God with the promise. The promise has come. Jesus has died. He is resurrected, he is raised, he is ascended. The spirit comes down into the world. And now the church is this woman, the bride of Christ.
[00:16:06] Well, where is the church? Notice she fled into the wilderness. And notice what the wilderness is.
[00:16:15] Notice where she has a place prepared by God.
[00:16:21] The seed is coming to the world.
[00:16:24] Jesus has won.
[00:16:27] Jesus has raised and ascended. And now the bride of Christ exists in a place prepared by God that is called the wilderness. And what is to happen in this wilderness for the Church? Notice she is to be nourished.
[00:16:41] How is she going to be nourished?
[00:16:43] The same way the people of God have been nourished throughout the whole story on the promise.
[00:16:50] She's going to remember the promise in the wilderness.
[00:16:53] She's going to be nourished on God's faithfulness in the wilderness. Notice 1,260 days. And we tried to unpack that somewhat a few weeks ago where if you go back to Daniel, you have the 70 weeks.
[00:17:09] Many believe the 69 weeks, which is 483 years that led up to Christ have been accomplished. And now we're in this parenthesis, stage age, waiting for the 70th week, which many believe are seven years of tribulation before Jesus comes.
[00:17:24] I just think that breaks down throughout Scripture.
[00:17:28] I think the 70th week is used symbolically to describe the present church age.
[00:17:34] In here, there's going to be times of intense tribulation during the church age. Now, many believe the church is raptured out for that. I just don't believe that connects with scripture. The people of God are always suffering. The people of God are always going through tribulation. I don't believe the book of Revelation makes much sense if the church isn't there, if it's already gone. No, he's writing to the church who exists in the wilderness now to be nourished with the promise. This is the same thing that happened with Israel.
[00:18:11] They were rescued from bondage and slavery in Egypt.
[00:18:19] The promise comes in.
[00:18:21] I will rescue you. I will deliver you. I will fulfill all of my promises. The people of God are rescued from Egypt.
[00:18:29] The gods of Egypt are toppled. They are made to look like fools. The people leave Egypt. They go through the Red Sea on dry land. And they look back as far as Pharaoh's armies are crushed.
[00:18:43] Victory.
[00:18:45] And then God says, victory. Yes, but we're going to the wilderness for a while, 40 years, so that you can learn to trust me.
[00:18:54] So that you can look back on this promise and in the wilderness be nourished. You're going to have to trust me in the wilderness because I'm going to feed you, I'm going to give you what you need to drink, and I'm going to make sure your clothes don't wear out. So what you have in the wilderness is me.
[00:19:11] What you have in the wilderness is the promise. And it's the same thing for the church today.
[00:19:17] We have been delivered from the tyrant, the tyranny of sin and death through the cross and an empty tomb. And we stand on this side of deliverance. But we ain't home yet.
[00:19:32] Where are we?
[00:19:34] In the wilderness.
[00:19:36] But notice this is a place of nourishment.
[00:19:39] We're to be nourished in the wilderness in this time, even of tribulation.
[00:19:44] How does that happen? Well, we are to learn that all we have is the promise. And all we need is the promise. This is what God is teaching us now that you have everything you need in me and you are to look back on the one who has delivered you, just like the people of God look back on Pharaoh crushed. And they were to know that the God who delivered them would rescue them to the promised land. And we are to be nourished on that promise. Even now, that's what God is doing to us in this time of even tribulation in the wilderness. The problem, we don't understand that. And I hate to say the church in America, but that's all I only way I can say it right now.
[00:20:31] We don't understand how suffering nourishes us because we've never had to really suffer for our faith. We've always been the people with the power.
[00:20:43] And now that that gets a little tense in our culture, we freak out.
[00:20:48] It could be that God has designed a wilderness for us so that we are nourished on the promise, like the people of God have been from the beginning. You see, many of us know that we have a lot of health nuts here.
[00:21:04] And you know that if you're trying to be healthy, it doesn't come from just eating what is good on top of everything that's bad, right?
[00:21:17] You can't go like I often do on a Sunday and eat a whole pizza.
[00:21:24] I don't do that. I don't know. I don't want to lie from up here.
[00:21:28] I will eat a lot of pizza on Sundays.
[00:21:35] But if at the end, after I finish also my concrete mixer from Culver's, I say to Denae, hey, fix me a salad, fix me a salad and give me some protein and some of that healthy food, kale and stuff you got in the refrigerator. Because I've got to overwhelm, overwhelm all the horrible things that I ate today to be healthy.
[00:21:59] That's not the way it works.
[00:22:01] You have to eliminate what is unhealthy for you.
[00:22:05] And that's what God does for us in the wilderness, in suffering, in tribulation, he eliminates the things that make us unhealthy. You see, we have a malnourished faith.
[00:22:18] We have a malnourished faith because we are constantly glutted with things that are healthy for us.
[00:22:25] Self reliance, comfort, safety. It's a convenient faith that we often use, but we don't pay a cost for it. So it's not really a strong faith. But you cannot learn, as Jesus said in his own wilderness, man shall not live by bread alone. Until you're hungry, God often makes us hungry. To prove all you need is the promise.
[00:22:51] Man lives on every word that comes from the mouth of God. You don't know that till all you have is the promise of God.
[00:22:58] So God puts us placed in places of wilderness where all we have is the promise and we cling to the promise. Again, you don't know that the Lord is good until he's all that you have.
[00:23:10] And we exist in a time where the Lord is all we have, even when we face opposition. Notice verse 7.
[00:23:19] In this time of wilderness, we have to look to heaven and the gospel that is preached in heaven. So you're saying we're in a wilderness. Well, where's the promise?
[00:23:30] Well, here John gives us a picture of the promise in heaven. Notice the promise, first of all, that Satan has been defeated. Verse 7. Now, war arose in heaven. And Michael, this is this archangel who fights for the people of God in the heavenly realms. Him and his angels are fighting against the dragon. There is this warfare that goes on in the spiritual realm. If we could see it, it would terrify us. Here during the time of Christ, Jesus is on earth. He is living, he is dying, he is being resurrected. At that time, there is intense cosmic warfare in heaven.
[00:24:07] And the dragon and his angels fight back. But notice they are defeated and there was no longer a place for them in heaven. Now we understand that before the fall, there seems to be a time where Satan is cast down on the earth. That's why he shows up as a snake. But it does seem that even still, Satan has a place in the heavenly realms.
[00:24:31] It's almost as if he is like a dog barking out in the streets.
[00:24:38] He's been cast down to earth. The ruler of this world has limited power for a time.
[00:24:45] But what is he doing in this realm?
[00:24:50] What is he doing? Even the text says in heaven.
[00:24:54] Well, Job helps us understand what the serpent is doing. If you go back to the beginning of Job, what is Satan doing?
[00:25:04] He's talking to God.
[00:25:05] And he's saying to God, he will deny you if he suffers.
[00:25:11] He will deny you if he suffers. What is Satan doing? He is accusing Job.
[00:25:18] He is accusing him of having little faith. And it is what Job, Satan does from the beginning. He lies about God's goodness to Job.
[00:25:29] God's not good. You're suffering. Same thing he did with Eve. God's not good. He's withholding things from you.
[00:25:36] But he says to God, see, they don't really trust you.
[00:25:40] They're not righteous.
[00:25:43] And so there is this play in the heavenly realms that. That curses the people of promise. It's not just on earth where Satan is raging up until the time of Christ. He is raging in heaven, pleading his case, lying about God's goodness and accusing the saints. And we get to this section of scripture verses 9 through 11 that is the centerpiece of the book.
[00:26:12] And we see that Satan has been cast out and what goes on in heaven is Satan's lies and accusations are replaced with the gospel. And so if we're going to be nourished on the promise, we look to heaven where the gospel is being proclaimed right now. Notice verse 9. The kingdom has come and God is good. Satan's a liar. Notice the great dragon was thrown down the ancient serpent. Back to Genesis 3, who is called the devil, that means slanderer. He falsely accuses. And notice Satan the adversary, he is the enemy. He is the deceiver that has led astray the whole world, bringing sin and death into the world. He is thrown down to the earth and and his angels were thrown down with him. There is the declaration that when the kingdom of God has come, Satan has been defeated. And then there is this announcement. In verse 10 I heard a loud voice in heaven saying, now salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and authority of Christ has come. Heaven announces the kingdom has come.
[00:27:17] And on earth, in the death and resurrection, Satan has been defeated.
[00:27:22] And so now what we hear in heaven is God is good.
[00:27:26] Satan, you can't lie around here anymore. The gospel is true, God is good. And there is an announcement of this in heaven. But next we see the gospel declared in heaven in that the Lamb is standing and we are forgiven.
[00:27:43] Notice for the accuser of our brothers has been thrown down. This loud voice, these angels in heaven are declaring, jesus has come, God is good.
[00:27:55] And so Satan's lies are false.
[00:27:59] But also his accusations are now false. They can't be heard in heaven any longer. And here, the one who accuses them day and night before our God there seems to be this activity in the demonic realm where there is this activity where the people of God are accused over and over and over and over again before God. If they suffer, they will deny you.
[00:28:25] Let them suffer and they will deny you this accusation that they're not going to be faithful. But notice they have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb.
[00:28:40] You see, the truth is we're not righteous.
[00:28:43] We're not faithful up until the cross. All of his accusations are 100% true and right.
[00:28:54] And Satan is in heaven saying, see, they don't trust you. See, they will deny you.
[00:29:01] See, Watch them. Look at the story of the Old Testament.
[00:29:05] People who are unfaithful, but God continues to be faithful. Look, God, they're not, they're weak.
[00:29:13] But now the gospel has come. And notice they have conquered by the blood of the Lamb, not by their faithfulness.
[00:29:23] It's true, God is good, but it's also True, you're sinful.
[00:29:28] But now the accusations have been toppled. By the blood of the Lamb at the cross. Jesus paid in full the debt for your sin, the just wrath that you deserved. In your place, he took on all of your accusations that Satan could throw at you. And he died for them.
[00:29:47] He was resurrected to prove your sins are paid for. The guilt is gone, you are covered in blood instead of the accusations that are true. The blood of the Lamb who is standing and in him standing. You have conquered in his victory. It is your victory. And the advocate has replaced the accuser. Where? In heaven?
[00:30:11] Think about that right now.
[00:30:14] Everything Satan could say is true. About your sin and your guilt.
[00:30:19] It's true.
[00:30:21] But now the advocate has replaced the replaced the accuser. And he's pleading his blood that declares you are not guilty because of his death. For you. What a beautiful picture.
[00:30:35] What a beautiful imagery to remind yourself of that on a daily basis as you struggle with guilt. It is Jesus who is in heaven, standing, preaching, declaring, you are forgiven. But next we see the gospel in heaven. The witness is true and death has been defeated. Notice they have conquered through the cross, but also by the word of their testimony. What is the word of their testimony? What is the witness of the church beginning in Acts? What is the witness of this church? That Jesus is Lord and not Caesar. And what happens when you say that? You die.
[00:31:10] And if you're scared of death, you don't say that because you don't want to die.
[00:31:14] But the martyrs in heaven declare that death is defeated. How do they declare it? Notice they love not their lives unto death. The martyrs witness those who have spoken the lordship of Christ and died for it. They speak over the serpent's lie, the that death is to be feared.
[00:31:33] Now think about that. Satan says, God isn't good if you're suffering.
[00:31:38] No, the gospel is, I know God is good. I've seen it in a cross and a resurrection.
[00:31:43] Satan says, you are guilty and you are condemned.
[00:31:48] But the blood says something else. I'm forgiven in Christ.
[00:31:55] That's a better word. That's a better gospel.
[00:31:58] And then Satan says to us, no, do not preach. Do not witness Jesus as Lord. You might die and death is final.
[00:32:07] Well, no, the resurrection says it's not.
[00:32:11] The resurrection says that Jesus has been raised from the dead and I will be too.
[00:32:17] And those who in heaven who have died for their faith are standing there saying, yes, it's true, death is defeated. Heaven proclaims a different gospel to us today.
[00:32:26] But just as Satan's lies in heaven have been replaced by gospel truth.
[00:32:30] As this is true in heaven, it needs to be the same in your heart.
[00:32:35] This is where we struggle with this reality in our heart.
[00:32:39] Some of us are suffering today, right now.
[00:32:42] And the whisper of Satan is saying, see, God isn't good.
[00:32:50] You've lost your marriage.
[00:32:53] You have lost a friend.
[00:32:56] You're suffering.
[00:32:59] I told you, God isn't God.
[00:33:04] And while the truth that God is good in the gospel has been replaced by Satan's lies in heaven, that needs to become true in your heart. How do you do that? You remind yourself of the gospel.
[00:33:15] Jesus died for my sins. The kingdom has come.
[00:33:19] He offers me this eternal good rule forever. God is good.
[00:33:25] Maybe I can't see it right now, maybe I don't understand it. But even in suffering, God is good. And there are some of us here today. And your past is haunting you as you sit in these chairs.
[00:33:37] You're here today and you say, I tried to do something good on a Sunday. I tried to go do the church thing. And you're seated here today and all you can think about are your worst sinful moments in your past. And they are haunting you. It's like they are hunting you down in these chairs today.
[00:33:56] It's the work of the evil one. It's the lie of the one who's been cast to the earth. And he is accusing you. You're guilty.
[00:34:04] You're guilty of your sin and you deserve death and you deserve condemnation.
[00:34:08] But we are to look to the Lamb who is standing today. We are to open up our eyes and be reminded the Lamb is standing. The slain Lamb is standing. And his blood speaks a better gospel to you. Today, instead of the snake who is barking out your guilt, there is a Savior who is preaching your innocence. In him, you stand innocent. You stand forgiven. Whatever that is, you have to replace it with the truth of the gospel in your ears and in your heart.
[00:34:46] Some of you are here today and you believe death is final because you have stood over the grave of a loved one and there is nothing more final in your life.
[00:34:58] That was the day for some of you that your life here ended.
[00:35:03] How could there be anything beyond death? That's the worst moment in my life.
[00:35:09] And some of us are struggling with our own sickness and we fear the day that is coming.
[00:35:16] We're going to the doctor, we're having treatments. We're looking at medical staff all the time. And you are scared to death. And Satan is saying to you along the way, I told you, death is final.
[00:35:32] Oh, you had it good for a While this world was your home, all coming to an end now.
[00:35:39] And in your mind you are beginning to believe his lies.
[00:35:43] What are you to do? You are to look to heaven, where death has been defeated. The lamb is standing. And there is a long history of people who are willing to say Jesus is Lord and die for it, because death has been defeated. And you are to look to this witness, Jesus has defeated death. And you are to even say, jesus is Lord. And if it costs me my life, guess what? Death is gain.
[00:36:09] Death is gain for the believer. You look to heaven and you see that and you hear that. And this is the announcement of heaven here in verse 12. Therefore, O heavens, rejoice and you who dwell in them. Heaven is secure with the rule of Christ and the gospel. But woe to you, O earth and sea. And so heaven is secure. Satan has been cast out, but he's been cast down to earth, to the earth and he still rages. Notice great wrath, for he knows his time is short. We still have to interact with this great dragon. But what does this interaction look like? Verse 13. When the dragon had saw that he had been thrown down to earth, he pursued the woman who had given birth to the child. Post. We go back to verse six. Post ascension, the people of God are in the wilderness. Notice verse 14. The woman had given them two wings of the great eagle so that they might fly from the serpent into the wilderness. They have escaped sin and death. They have escaped his weapons of sin and death to the place where she would be nourished for a time and times and a half a time. This is going back to verse six. We are in the wilderness, but we have the gospel. And this is a picture of Exodus. And even in Isaiah that we read earlier that God delivered the people from Egypt and he bore them up on eagle's wings. We have been delivered by the gospel, even though we were in the wilderness. Verse 15. Then the serpent poured water like a river out of his mouth after the woman to sweep her away with the flood.
[00:37:44] Again we go back to Exodus. The Hebrew midwives.
[00:37:50] The pharaoh is seeking to drown babies in the Nile. The same sort of warfare is going on with the church as the church believes the gospel. As life comes into the church, the serpent is trying to destroy the church. Why all this imagery? What is he talking about here? He is trying to pull us in with this imagery and say, you are in the same story. And notice it's all imagery from the Old Testament. As the people of God are waiting for the promise.
[00:38:21] You see, you're to read your Bible and these things are to pop off the page when you know the whole story.
[00:38:28] That's why it's important to know your Bible from beginning to end. We even read here in Revelation, which John is a genius with the Old Testament and he is pointing to this symbolism to help us see we are in that same story of warfare where Pharaoh tried to kill the people of God, Herod tried to kill the people of God. And as the gospel of life comes about in the church, Satan is still trying to kill the people of God.
[00:38:55] But notice verse 16.
[00:38:57] But the earth came to help the woman and the earth opened its mouth and swallowed the river that the dragon had poured from his mouth.
[00:39:06] Where in the Bible have we seen the ground open up and swallow the enemies of God?
[00:39:12] If we go to numbers 16 where the people in the wilderness and the ground opens up and swallows rebels against God.
[00:39:24] The rivers so often in the Old Testament are described as the enemies of God. And here what God is saying is even when Satan lashes out again at the church, God will protect them.
[00:39:35] Now it could be here that all kings who try to oppose the church eventually die. They're swallowed in death.
[00:39:46] But the point is we're in the same story.
[00:39:49] Now many, what they will do with verses 13 through 16 is they will say, this is the early church period. This was an intense time of persecution.
[00:40:00] By 96 AD, 40,000 Christians had been killed under the reign of Nero and Domitian. And so what we've covered so far could point to that time period.
[00:40:11] Not very sure about that, but there is intense persecution after the resurrection and ascension. It's not as though Jesus is raised from the dead, ruling and reigning. And in the book of Acts, everything's hunky dory.
[00:40:26] No, their lives are threatened, threatened for many years to come.
[00:40:32] But notice Satan fails every time. That's the point. He comes after the church over and over, but he fails.
[00:40:40] And then verse 17, then the dragon became furious with the woman. It is as though he can't succeed. He's trying to kill her. He can't.
[00:40:49] He became furious and he went off to make war with the rest of her offspring. As the church continues to grow, he continues this activity. Notice those who keep the commandments of God and hold the testimony of Jesus. So this is how we align with the promise today.
[00:41:05] We believe in Jesus. We believe the witness, we follow after Jesus. And what goes on here? Satan is furious with us. He hates us. He is trying to destroy us. If you align with the gospel, if you align with the church, you will be hated.
[00:41:23] And you might say, no, I'm one of those Christians. I'm not a jerk for Jesus. Everybody loves me.
[00:41:29] Maybe I'm not one of those Christians, but Satan hates both of us.
[00:41:34] You hate it.
[00:41:36] And he will try to destroy your life.
[00:41:39] He will try to prove that the promise is false. But notice this picture that ends the chapter. And he stood on the sand of the sea.
[00:41:50] Why is that important?
[00:41:52] Just kind of weird. If you don't know your Bible.
[00:41:56] Just kind of weird.
[00:42:00] When the promise was given to Abraham, what was said, your descendants will be like the sand of the sea. And so we see the foolishness of the serpent who's been defeated. He is raging against the church. He's trying to destroy the church. And his feet are covered in imagery of the promise.
[00:42:22] He can't do it. He can't stop the church because he has been defeat it. And the point here is, do not be scared. When the serpent rages, he has already lost.
[00:42:37] And he stands with images of the promise all around and proof that God's going to continue the story.
[00:42:45] You see what Satan's like right now and you think about the killer in the courtroom who has issued the sentence to death. And he has handcuffs on. And so often, what does he do?
[00:42:58] Crazy, deranged, begins to scream, begins to yell out in the courtroom, begins to threaten those who have accused him, who have declared his guilt, his defeat.
[00:43:13] Rage. That's Satan.
[00:43:16] He may be raging right now, but he has been sentenced to death and he has no power over the church. And if you're there, that's terrifying, but he has no power.
[00:43:30] A ferocious dog on a chain that is barking, that is coming after you is terrifying.
[00:43:39] But because of the chain, he has no power.
[00:43:42] Satan has been bound and he will rage and he will throw fits and he will seek to destroy the world around you. But you are not to fear, because every time he lashes out, the promise wins.
[00:43:58] The promise wins. When he lashes out, we even see that church historians, church fathers would say the seed of the church is the blood of the martyrs.
[00:44:09] And the more they are killed, the more the church grows every time he lashes out.
[00:44:16] And so we live in a time where the world is very discouraging and we see the work of the evil one all around. We see him throwing fits, just opposition to Christianity.
[00:44:30] We see the serpent throwing fits, cultural demise.
[00:44:35] We see fake Christians who believe his lies.
[00:44:39] We see him throwing fits.
[00:44:42] And how are we to be encouraged? It looks like Satan's winning.
[00:44:47] Look at the world around you. Satan is winning. What are we to do?
[00:44:53] Well, we're to remember vbs, Where the seed born of woman has those who are following him, children who are declaring, God always wins.
[00:45:14] And we see the promise continuing to march forward.
[00:45:18] We're to. We're to look at the baptismal waters where those who have been just destroyed by Satan's accusations, you are guilty. And they stand before the waters and say, no, the lamb is standing. I am forgiven.
[00:45:35] I have died with Christ, and I have been resurrected to new life. And what do we see before us? We see the promise marching. We see it moving forward. And we stand over the bed of dying saints who look us in the eyes, dying, their bodies wracked with disease. And they look us into the eyes and they say, I can't wait to be with Jesus. There's the promise.
[00:46:01] Now, don't look at the news to be encouraged.
[00:46:04] Look at the church.
[00:46:06] And in the church, you see Satan is bound and defeated because he can't shut the Promise up.
[00:46:12] The promise continues to move from generation to generation to generation. The story of the promise can't be stopped by the full dragon.
[00:46:24] CS Lewis in I'm trying, guys. I'm trying.
[00:46:28] In the Voyage of Dawn, the Dawn Treader, the character Eustace, he's lured into a cave of a dead dragon.
[00:46:38] And there, sleeping on the dead dragon's treasure, he becomes a dragon himself. And it's beautiful. I have time for it. Eventually, Aslan has to rip the scales off of his body. Beautiful picture of the gospel.
[00:46:54] But Lewis explains the reason he was lured into a dragon's lair is he didn't know about dragons.
[00:47:02] Why did he not know about dragons? He had only read the wrong books.
[00:47:08] They had a lot to say about exports, imports and government and drains.
[00:47:14] But they were weak on dragons.
[00:47:18] Some of us are weak on dragons because we scroll economy, tariffs, war, and we think that's all there is.
[00:47:30] And we begin to think that this is just a physical earthly battle, and it's not.
[00:47:36] In the Great Dragon, he's still whispering, he's still lurking. He's a roaring lion seeking to destroy us. But because we're so focused on earthly things, we don't know there's a dragon.
[00:47:51] And that's what makes us dragons ourselves, with the same destiny of the great dragon, Death.
[00:47:59] You see, it's a good thing the Bible is a book with dragons, because they do exist.
[00:48:05] And it's important to remember, if the problem is a dragon, we have a great dragon slayer.
[00:48:11] You don't need to be weak on dragons. They're real. And they hate you. And there's one who hates you more than anybody or anything.
[00:48:19] Just don't be weak on the promise, too.
