A Study Of The Book Of Revelation
Lesson No. 15: Chapter 12
Date: December 3rdand 10th, 2003,
Wednesday Evening Adult Bible Class
Speaker: John Phillis
Note: Much
of the information for this Study of Revelation was taken from the
book “Revelation Through First Century Glasses” by W. B. West. Other sources: “The Living Word, Study
of Revelation, Parts I & II” by Dr. Frank
Pack; “Revelation” by Jim McGuiggan; “Commentary
on Revelation” by Homer Hailey; “Commentary on
Revelation” by Burton Coffman; “The Book of Revelation
– Spiritual Sword Lectureship, October 18 – 22,
1998”; “Commentary on Revelation” by Howard
Winters; “Revelation for Christians Today” by Lonnie
Woodruff; “Unlocking Revelation” by J. Stafford
North.
Objective in Studying this
Chapter:
1) To
note the primary force behind the persecution that was about to
come upon the early Christians
2) To
appreciate why the persecution of the early church was so
intense
THE WOMAN, THE CHILD, AND THE DRAGON (VERSES
1-6)
“Now a great sign appeared in
heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet,
and on her head a garland of twelve stars. 2 Then being with child,
she cried out in labor and in pain to give birth.
3 And another sign appeared in heaven: behold, a
great, fiery red dragon having seven heads and ten horns, and seven
diadems on his heads. 4 His tail drew a third of the stars of
heaven and threw them to the earth. And the dragon stood before the
woman who was ready to give birth, to devour her Child as soon as
it was born. 5 She bore a male Child who was to rule all nations
with a rod of iron. And her Child was caught up to God and His
throne. 6 Then the woman fled into the wilderness, where she has a
place prepared by God, that they should feed her there one thousand
two hundred and sixty days.”
A Brief
Introduction
The seven seals have been opened. The
seventh trumpet has sounded as we acknowledged last week at the
close of chapter 11. We now see associated
with the sounding of that seventh trumpet that “a great
sign appeared in heaven.”
This is introducing some rather difficult text
for us to deal with. If we have seen some things that have
not been very clear and somewhat confusing, and that there’s
a lot of disagreement about among those who are considered to be
scholars in this area, we’re getting into some real
ones now! That is, what is meant
here? What is this symbolism that John is relating, that John
is seeing?
First of all, I think it’s important for
us to always keep in mind the figurative nature here; and moreover,
you see how John begins this. He says, “Now a great
sign appeared in heaven…,”
[verse 1a]. Well, we know,
then, right from that point onward that we’re
not dealing with something which is
literal here. We want to attempt to
understand it; we want to attempt to
define it as best we can, but we’re
certainly not dealing with something which is
literal, because, once again, John has identified this as a
SIGN—something that is representative of
something else. Even though what John saw here is something
that is really supernatural, it’s something that no doubt
defied description, it is something that transpired 2000 years ago,
or thereabouts, it is still something that we can
share as we read these words. It is as if we
are there to see it for ourselves. We want to attempt to
understand, of course, as much about this as we possibly
can.
We mentioned that, being a
sign, the suggestion is that, first of all, this
same word that is translated here “sign” could
also be translated “miracle” or
“wonder.” It was something that was phenomenal,
something that was fantastic, something that defied description in
human terms. But it was also representative of something, as
well. We try not to have too much of a literal approach here
to some of these things, albeit, I think we can
understand what is being said as we look at it from the figurative
point of view.
The Woman with Child (verses
1-2)
John is introducing something of a great
conflict, and this conflict is going to be played out here
in these next few verses. What John sees, this
sign, is a woman clothed with the sun. She
is radiant; she is
glorious. The moon is under her feet.
She’s wearing a crown of twelve starts on her head. She
is regally adorned and has this regal appearance
about her [“a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon
under her feet, and on her head a garland of twelve
stars,” [verse 1b].
But, there is a deep contrast
which exists. In spite of this regal appearance that she has,
she is crying with pain because she is with
child—she is in labor to give birth to a child
[“Then being with child, she cried out in labor and in
pain to give birth,” [verse
2].
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