Grace in Tullahoma

The Victorious Baby – 21

Revelation 12:1-17

Who is bummed that Christmas is over? I know it’s only been a few weeks since Christmas, but it feels so far away. If you know me at all, you know that I love Christmas. One of my farewell sayings to people throughout the year is, “Merry Christmas!” And anytime anyone says it’s not Christmas, I reply, “Every day is Christmas in my heart.” We usually think of Christmas just at Christmas time. We don’t usually study the beginning of the gospels except for in the month of December, but Christmas matters every day of the year. It matters for our salvation, and it matters for what happens at the end of time. We don’t have the cross of redemption without the cradle of the incarnation. We don’t have salvation if Jesus never came. But he did, and he came to wage war. That’s what we see here in Revelation 12. I love what my favorite pastor/theologian, Eugene Peterson, said about this chapter, “This is not the nativity story we grew up with, but it is the nativity story all the same.”[1]

This chapter we’re starting to study tonight gives us an epic overview of the grand redemptive story of the Bible and of history. It tells of salvation from the past, in the present, and into the future. Tonight, we’re going to look at the first part. Right off the bat we see a woman about to give birth, a baby boy to be born, and a powerful dragon. That makes for an exciting adventure story, huh?! Imagine if that is what we read at our Christmas eve services and sang carols about!

Revelation 12:1-2

God fulfills his promises. There is so much history in these verses that can be easy to overlook. The description of the woman in verse 1 comes directly from the dream Joseph had in Genesis 37:9-11. In his dream the sun represents his father Jacob, the moon Rachel, and the twelve stars are the twelve tribes of Israel.[2] The woman likely represents a righteous remnant of Israel, the people of God. We can see this a little more in verse 2, where the woman is crying out in birth pains, about to give birth. The Old Testament often refers to the nation of Israel as a mother giving birth.[3] Think of it this way, the nation of Israel suffered and agonized for centuries waiting for the Messiah to come, and how did he finally come? He was born. A baby boy. God fulfills his promises. And he always comes through, no matter what your situation seems like at the time. But a mother and baby about to be born are not all we see in these verses. There’s something more going on.

Revelation 12:3-4

Remember, we are reading a history of the past right here. The dragon is Satan. It tells us that in verse nine. How it describes him in verse 3 is like the fourth beast in Daniel 7, and it’s meant to show how powerful he is. Satan is more powerful than we know, and he is more active than we often think. Verse 4 reminds us of when and how Satan fell. There was a primordial war in heaven, and Satan rebelled against God. A third of the angels chose to follow him in his rebellion against God.[4] We can see this in Isaiah 14:12-15.

12 “How you are fallen from heaven,    O Day Star, son of Dawn!How you are cut down to the ground,    you who laid the nations low!13 You said in your heart,    ‘I will ascend to heaven;above the stars of God    I will set my throne on high;I will sit on the mount of assembly    in the far reaches of the north;14 I will ascend above the heights of the clouds;    I will make myself like the Most High.’15 But you are brought down to Sheol,    to the far reaches of the pit.

This war was waged in heaven before God ever created man. I don’t know if you’ve ever deeply thought about this, but Adam and Eve were not the first who were fallen. There was already a fallen serpent, Satan, in that perfect Eden. And that serpent hates God and the things of God and he will do whatever it takes to bring as many people down with him. Just like he deceived Adam and Eve and led them to sin, he does the same w

The Faithful Witnesses – 20

Revelation 11:1-19

A few days ago, January 8, was the 67th anniversary of the death of Jim Elliot and four other young men in the Ecuadorian rainforest, by the Huaorani people. These people were unreached and dangerous. Most people groups who are unreached are so because they are difficult and dangerous to reach. Jim was only 28 years old, and he was speared to death trying to share Christ with these people, along with the four others. Jim is famously quoted as saying, “’He is no fool, who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.” You cannot keep your life, why not give it away for the sake of the gospel. What you gain is life that is never ending. Jim was willing to give his life for the sake of being a witness to the gospel of Jesus. He left behind a wife Elisabeth, and a 10-month-old daughter. Three years later his wife would go back to those same people to live and share Christ with them. And those people who once killed those who came to be a witness of Christ to them ended up believing in Christ for themselves.

God has had a faithful witness throughout all generations. In the text for tonight, even though there is much in the details that is uncertain and debated, you can know this: God has his faithful witness, and the gospel prevails. We’re going to see some symbolism like usual, and like usual, there are many different explanations people give to each point. As we have done throughout this whole study of Revelation, we will do again here. We will major on the majors and minor on the minors. At the center of what we will see in this text are two witnesses.

Revelation 11:1-3 – 1 Then I was given a measuring rod like a staff, and I was told, “Rise and measure the temple of God and the altar and those who worship there, 2 but do not measure the court outside the temple; leave that out, for it is given over to the nations, and they will trample the holy city for forty-two months. 3 And I will grant authority to my two witnesses, and they will prophesy for 1,260 days, clothed in sackcloth.”

Right off the bat, the three major areas in this text that are debated are mentioned (the temple, the time, and the witnesses). Like most things in Revelation, you can either take them symbolically or literally, and whichever way you choose to read the text is how you will interpret it. Just like through all the previous chapters of Revelation, I don’t think I nor anyone else can definitively tell you what these things exactly mean. There have been dozens of different interpretations by great scholars and Bible teachers. What I will do is tell you what some of the major views are and we will again major on the majors. First, right at the beginning we see the temple mentioned.

The temple refers to either the people of God or a literal rebuilt temple.

Those who say the temple here is symbolic and refers to the people of God[1] do so because the New Testament depicts the people of God as the temple (Eph 2:19-21, 1 Pet 2:4-10). The temple has always been about God dwelling with man, not the building itself (Eph 2:22). And since the death of Jesus, God does dwell with man—the Holy Spirit indwells them (1 Cor 3:16). When Jesus breathed his last, the curtain of the temple ripped from top to bottom (Matt 27:51). There was no need for a physical temple because the once for all sacrifice had been made (Heb 10). Another reason is that here John is given a rod to not only measure the temple, like in Ezekiel 40:2-3, but he is to measure “those who worship there.”

It’s interesting to think about how the readers of John’s letter here would have interpreted it. I don’t know fully how they would have understood it, but I do know that most people believe Revelation was written in the 90s AD. The original temple was built by King Solomon and was destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar in 586 BC. The temple was later rebuilt, which you read about in some of the minor prophets (Ezra, Nehemiah, Haggai). Bu