Revelation Explained

This site contains my personal views on Revelation. I will be teaching through the book verse by verse. My teachings will be from a conservative evangelical background.

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Sunday, September 17, 2006

The Child

"His tail dragged down one-third of the stars, which he threw to the earth. He stood before the woman as she was about to give birth to her child, ready to devour the baby as soon as it was born. She gave birth to a boy who was to rule all nations with an iron rod. And the child was snatched away from the dragon and was caught up to God and to his throne. And the woman fled into the wilderness, where God had prepared a place to give her care for 1,260 days." (Revelation 12:4-6 - New Living Translation)

The third part of the stars that the dragon casts to the earth are taken to represent the angels who followed Satan in his original rebellion. Satan's original name, Lucifer, means day star. It would seem then that one third of the angels followed Satan in his rebellion against the Lord. These angels are now demons or devils. They seek to promote evil on the earth.

Satan was waiting for the birth of the Messiah, Jesus Christ. As soon after the birth as possible, Satan hoped to destroy Jesus. He used his puppet, Herod the Great, to slaughter the infants of Bethlehem. However, God warned Joseph. Joseph, Mary and the infant Jesus fled Bethlehem before the soldiers arrived to carry out Herod's wicked command. Satan failed in all his attempts to destroy or tempt Jesus.

So the man child of verse five is Jesus. He will one day rule the world with a rod of iron. Psalm two in speaking of the king that God would set up in Zion states that he would break his opponents with a rod of iron. (Psalm 2:9) Revelation 19:15 also speaks of Jesus ruling with a rod of iron.

John in a single sentence jumps from the birth of Christ to his ascension into heaven. The ascension of Jesus shows that Satan was completely defeated. Jesus is the victor and will soon return to claim his prize.

The fleeing into the wilderness described in verse six is described in more detail later in this chapter. God has prepared a place of safety for the Jewish people. For the last three and a half years of the Tribulation, they will hide in this refuge to escape the persecution of the Anti-Christ.

3 Comments:

Blogger tam said...

David,

I am trying to study the book of Revelations. I searched Revelations explained on google and found you. I just wanted to verify that the child was Jesus and that was in the past. The reason I ask is because I have read that Revelations is a book about past events and if this was past, is it your opinion that the mark of the beast could be past as well? Emperor Domitian ruled about the time of the writing of the book and made all citizens bear his mark before they could buy or sell in his country. He also had statues of himself at all entrances to the city, which people were required to bow to. The number of his name was also 666. If you have an opinion on this and the time to write, my email is tamela8@hotmail.com.

Thanks in advance.
Tam

12:11 PM  
Blogger David Frank Wilson said...

Tam,
The child mentioned in Revelation 12 is Jesus. The woman is Israel. Many good Christian believers do believe that the events of Revelation are in the past. They have what they believe are strong arguments for their opinion.
However, I do not agree with them. Certainly, John in this chapter does refer to events in the past in verses 1 to 5. This describes Jesus coming to this earth and returning to heaven. In my opinion, most of Revelation describes events in the future. If you accept the description of events as John writes, there are many things that may have seen some type of partial fulfilment in the past, but have never occurred to the extent that he described.
For example, Revelation 6:8 states that a quarter of the world's population will die. Revelation 9:16 describes an army of 200 million soldiers. There is no historical event that fits the description of the 2 Witnesses in Revelation 11. I could give many more examples.
I hope you will read more of my blog, and what others have written about this important book in the Bible. Keep an open mind, ask the Holy Spirit to show you what is true, and consider what the plain sense of what John writes means.

David

4:49 PM  
Blogger Jonathan said...

Have you watched "the star of Bethlehem"?
It explains from an astronomical point of view what this is speaking of.
The Bible says that the stars were made for "signs and for seasons", why would God not mark His Son's conception, in the skies???

9:12 PM  

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