Revelation 12:3-12 (The Dragon And The War For The World)

Thank you for subscribing to the Shepherds Church podcast. This is our Lord's Day Sermon. We pray that as we declare the Word of God that you would be encouraged Strengthened in your faith and that you would catch a greater vision of who Christ is.

May you be blessed in the hearing of God's Word and may the Lord be with you. While many churches this Christmas will be preaching all kinds of different Christmas series you know thinking about like Joseph given the dreams and his visions or Zechariah with his divine encounter when he's in the holy place or King Herod having his meltdown or the barren woman who's gonna have a baby or The babe in the manger or the angels in the sky or the shepherds in the fields or the wise men on camels.

The Sign of the Woman and the Dragon in Revelation 12

Our series is in Revelation. And we're looking at the sign that played out in the heavens we're looking at. We're looking above the fray of the field. We're looking above the palaces above Bethlehem and above the highest point in Judea to see this great sign that God has given us in the heavens of an apocalyptic Christmas and To do that We need to understand what signs are and that was what our first week in the series was all about is Understanding what a sign is.

A sign is given to a particular people at a particular place at a particular time. Concerning things that have to do with them. We don't look at road signs and think that that's how I'm fast. I'm supposed to drive in Zimbabwe.

We look at them as oh These are laws for Chelmsford because the sign applies to the place and the time in the second week after. Realizing that we saw that there was a great sign in the heavens a sign of a woman.

Who we talked about who she was. She is dressed like Israel in this passage. She is crowned like Judah in this passage and she is persecuted like the New Testament Church and in that She is the people of God eschatologically, so universal the past present and future people of God bought and paid for by Christ.

Old Testament and New that's who she is. Week three we began our look at the dragon and what his war is and we saw that he first began his war In heaven and we saw that in the Old Testament that the dragon is a symbol of chaos and wickedness and rebellion.

We saw also that a dragon was a symbol of a Seraphim how the word actually seraph comes from fire-breathing dragon. And we alluded to the fact that this is the perfect title for Satan. Because he was an angel in the presence of God singing along with the heavenly choirs until he was cast down and isn't it interesting that Satan the fire-breathing dragon was stripped of his wings and he was made to Slither like a beast on the ground during his fall.

So that was last week. This week we continue and maybe go a little weirder. I've actually I've said once before that I was preaching a sermon that you might call deep weird. This one will also be in that same vein, but we're in Revelation.

So it's acceptable. Today we're gonna look at four things. We're gonna look at first. Where did the war on earth begin last week? We talked about the war in heaven this week. We're gonna talk about the war on earth.

Where did it begin it began in Eden and we're gonna see evidence of how that war progressed throughout the history of Judah throughout the New Testament and ultimately leading to Satan's destruction event at the cross and in AD 70.

And then after we look at that, we're gonna see how Satan enlisted the Roman Empire to help do his bidding and Then when we end we're going to tie everything together with an application on What does this mean for Christmas?

So with that will you turn with me to Revelation 12? We're gonna read 3 through 12 today and we're gonna be bouncing around a little bit between these passages. But Revelation 12 3 through 12 if you'll join me there.

And as I said, go ahead and buckle up your seat belt because it might be a little bit of a wild ride. Revelation 12. Then another sign appeared in heaven. Behold a great red dragon having seven heads and ten horns and on his heads were seven diadems and his tail swept away a third of the stars of heaven and threw them to the earth and The dragon stood before the woman who was about to give birth so that when she gave birth He might devour her child.

And she gave birth to a son a male child who is to rule all the nations with a rod of iron. And her child was caught up to God and to his throne and the woman fled into the wilderness where she had a place prepared by God and That there she would be nourished for 1 ,260 days.

And there was war in heaven. Michael and his angels rate. Waging war with the dragon. The dragon his angels waged war and they were not strong enough. And there was no longer a place found for them in heaven.

And the great dragon was thrown down the serpent of old who is called the devil and Satan who deceives the whole world. And he was thrown down to the earth and his angels were thrown down with him and then I heard a loud voice in heaven saying.

Now the salvation and the power and the kingdom of God and the authority of his Christ have come. For the accuser of our brethren has been thrown down. He who accuses them before our God day and night and they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and because of the word of their testimony and They did not love their life even when faced with death for this reason rejoice.

Oh heavens and you who dwell in them, but woe to the earth and the sea. Because the devil has come down to you having great wrath knowing that he has only a short time. Let us pray Lord we thank you so much for this book.

This is your God-breathed word that we have before us today and would help us to to interact with it with Wisdom and with care and with deliberate. Lord help us because this book exposes our weaknesses.

Lord this book is a book that many have disagreed with and it's a book that many have been confused over and Lord, I pray that Even as we discuss a particular interpretation today That Lord you would use What you want to use in this and that Lord everything else that is said would fall away.

Lord help us as we approach your word, especially in a book like Revelation to be humble to be faithful But also bold it's in Jesus name. We pray. Amen.

Now I.

Could go on this topic For hours, and I don't say that metaphorically. There's a lot that needs to be covered for us to understand what's going on here. I don't take that for granted, but we don't have the ability to do it in a single Sunday.

So If if you're thoroughly confused by the end of it Christ is Lord and be happy in that.

And.

If you want to talk more about this topic, please hit me up or you know Subscribe to the broadcast and that's not a shameless plug, but do it. But we just can't cover everything in this so we're gonna do the best that we can.

Satan, Eden, Babel, and the War Against Canaan

So let's transition to who is this dragon? That's the first thing we need to figure out and the passage says that this dragon is red, which is interesting. That's not just his favorite color, by the way now last week We did talk about the fact that the word dragon comes from the Hebrew word seraphim.

Which is the angels who are worshiping God and the Holy of Holies singing? Holy, holy, holy to the Lord God Almighty. Also, we saw that there are fiery serpents in the Old Testament like Leviathan and Rahab which are pictures of chaos and we also Showed how this dragon is revealed as Satan the devil and the serpent by the Apostle John.

Now we're gonna consider an additional detail that he's a red dragon and the reason that he is red is very Important in the same way that the reason a flamingo is pink is also very important. If you didn't know this I actually won a chipotle burrito off of a debate on this very topic.

So tuck this one away because it's useful. All right. Flamingos are pink because they eat a lot of shrimp. That's why The dragon is red because he spills a lot of blood of the Saints. That's why he's red.

He's a murderer. Jesus says from the very beginning so from the beginning Satan has spilled the blood of God's people and it's that reason why he is typecast as Red a deep kind of red and that war goes all the way back to the Garden of Eden.

You remember that he was cast down to the earth and he slithered the first thing that he did is he slithered Into the garden and he slithered into the garden because he wanted to make war with the Saints.

He wanted to make war with Eden. He wanted to make war with Adam and Eve. Why did he do that? Because Adam and Eve while I said this last week wrongly while being made a little lower than the angels Adam and Eve were destined to actually judge the angels.

That's what Paul says. Do you not know that you were meant to judge angels? So Satan Being the highest created being out of the divine counsel Is now jealous at these humans because of their potential that one day they're going to judge him and how dare they judge him.

So he rebels in heaven and He's cast down to the earth and the first place that he goes is at the center of Eden to devastate this new family. He makes war with him and he captures earth from the man.

He swindles the kingdom out of Adam's hand who watched passively as his wife ate the fruit. There's a lot of people who will try to attach blame to Eve in this. I Particularly think that this is an Adam problem.

Because Adam was made to care for her. Adam was made to protect her. Adam was given the commands of God. He knew them because God told him which means that Adam was supposed to tell Eve and Adam was not supposed to stand by like a lovesick pup watching her do whatever she wanted to do in calling it cute.

Adam was supposed to intervene and he didn't and because of that all of humanity fell and The world was plunged into darkness and Satan took the crown. Adam was supposed to rule the nations. Adam was supposed to Be fruitful and multiply and spread the dominion of God to the ends of the earth and because of his fall Satan grabbed the crown.

Satan took over the world now. This is where this is one of those parts where it gets a little deep weird. If you don't like this part, that's okay. We'll be done with it in a second. But I think this is true when Satan fell from heaven.

He took a third of the angels with him. Where did they go? They were cast down to the earth. Maybe this is why every ancient culture has stories of fire-breathing dragons. And it's not because that they're so unsophisticated and we're so enlightened.

I Think it's because they were there. Seraphim means fire-breathing dragon. So all of the fallen seraphim are there on the earth. Every ancient society has a story of this. We can't really dismiss it Just right offhand.

Also.

There was another class of angels called cherubim. Cherubim are angels that sometimes show up as as these Massive beings with swords flaming swords that are guarding the way to the presence of God and then other times they show up in the in the heavens with Thousands of eyes.

Have you ever seen the Christmas meme of the angel on top of the tree? And it's this this strange-looking creature. That's a cherubim. Cherubim in the ancient world were shapeshifters. Every ancient culture has stories of beast-like creatures of Skinwalkers of all kinds of the.

Every ancient culture has Demonic activity that they report on that. They don't know how to explain. Perhaps it's because these fallen cherubim came down to the earth to torment man. The other thing that you have from the Garden of Eden to the flood is you have this this phenomenon?

Where fallen angels are also cast down now. Angels are seraphim cherubim and messengers. So what am I talking about? I'm talking about messenger angels that look like humans that have a human body whenever they show up in the Bible.

They show up like humans and in Genesis 6. It says that the sons of God the Elohim.

Had.

Relationships with the daughters of men. They were not pen pals. I don't need to go into what they were you get what they were. But they were not pen pals and it says that the what happened out of this relationship Was that there was the nephilim.

The nephilim came upon the earth. Which is why it says that God flooded the world because satan had polluted God's best creation so Destructively that you had these man-eating giants. I told you it was going to get deep weird roaming the earth.

It's kind of like in um, the lord of the rings. I find a way to do this every week. It's Where melkor if you if you read the sumerian where melkor takes the elves, which is eru's greatest creation. He turns them into orcs.

And he's punished Tremendously for that act and this way satan has taken god's most beautiful creation humans. And he's perverted them into something that is abominable. So god wipes the earth and floods it.

That's the first battle in the war is the battle between eden and the flood now after this. There's a second battle and we see that battle kicking up in. The tower called babel. It's good timing. Battle is a babel is a kind of proto canaan.

Battle is where the descendants of noah Gather at this tower and they say we're going to build a tower so that we can make a tower for the name for our Name that was not what god told humans to do. God told humans to spread out and make god's name.

Great not to gather in a tower in the plains of shinar and make their name great. So what they were doing was inherently satanic. And they rebelled against god and god punished them by confusing their languages and dividing the peoples and what you see is.

Every nation on earth then at that point was divided into different people groups. We don't have people groups until this point, but we do there at babel. You've got the African folks who are going to africa those types of areas.

You've got the asians who are going to asia. You've got the indians who are going to india. You've got all of these different people groups and I don't know exactly what they were back then I can only use categories that I have for me today.

But the world was divided into different ethnicities and languages based off of this punishment, but that's not the whole story.

Why?

Because while the earth was divided based off of people It was also divided based off of powers. What I mean by that Is that there were demonic powers? That were assigned particular geographies At the tower of babel and you're like i've never heard that before.

Trust me. It's in the bible. Let me show you. And i'm going to be using forgive me the new revised standard bible for this one. Not just so that I can find a bible that agrees with me because they actually translate the hebrew correctly here.

The nasb did not so I I i'm letting you know that i'm using this one. This is what it says in deuteronomy 32 8 through 9. When the most high apportioned the nations that was at the tower of babel when he divided the nations by languages.

When he divided humankind, he fixed the boundaries of the people according to the number of the gods. That's what the new revised standard version says the net bible says. According to the number of the divine assembly.

This word here is elohim. God apportioned the powers. He apportioned the elohim. He apportioned the sons of god. Not israel. If you read the esv, it will say the sons of israel. Israel doesn't exist yet.

In this passage Israel doesn't exist when the tower of babel was written or when it occurred. This is not the sons of israel. This is the sons of god the elohim. Now why is this important. Because in a war where satan is trying to conquer the world.

He's enlisting his troops To try to fight against it and god assigns these Demonic beings to different territories so that you have in a way you have what we would call territorial demons territorial Powers that are in every single region.

We see this in the book of daniel in daniel chapter 10. We said this last week daniel is praying. And his prayer is intercepted By one of these territorial demons called the prince of persia. The actual prince of persia the human being who was Reigning over persia did not catch daniel's prayers and start a war based off daniel's prayer.

It's a territorial demon. That is fighting against daniel in the spiritual realms. To stop the plans in the work of god.

Now.

Every single nation was divided into the powers. And there was one nation that god chose as his own. So if you think about all of the ancient territorial maps, however, they were laid out. All of them were assigned to demonic powers.

But one of them god said that one is going to be mine. I'm going to claim that one. I'm going to start building there. I'm going to cause my people to be there. I'm going to make my presence known there.

I'm going to start the war against satan from there. That's going to be my headquarters and that land was canaan. Canaan is the place where he drew his people out of the land of egypt and said I will be your god.

You will be my people. I will make my presence known here. And if you obey the terms of this covenant, then you will be my people and I will be your god. Now all of this I hope is starting to make sense.

But what happens next is I think obvious if we think through military tactics. All of the nations on earth had demonic powers assigned to it. God chooses canaan to be his realm. And then what does satan do?

I'll tell you what satan doesn't do. He doesn't do what my major did when he was in iraq and sit in the command tent eating beef jerky and cheese. He gets out of the command tent. And he says out of all the nations where i'm going to fight.

I'm not going to pick ancient orient. I'm not going to pick the ancient americans. I'm going to pick that place that yahweh said he was going to go and i'm going to go and i'm going to fight there. And what you see in the old testament and in the new testament is that canaan is the epicenter of spiritual warfare if you read through some of the ancient works and some of the some of the Ancient recordings of this canaan was an awful place.

It was a place where all kinds of spiritual activity is happening because it is there where god and satan are at war. And there's lots of evidence for this for instance. As soon as god Brings the israelites to the edge of the boundaries of the land.

The first thing that they say is we need to send 12 spies into the land and when they do. The spies come back with a bad report. Do you know what the bad report was? Giants. We're like grasshoppers to these people.

And they were not being metaphorical. They were not like hey. We are the size of mugsy bogues and there's some people and they're the size of lebron james. That's not what they were saying. They were saying that there are giants in this land and we are terrified.

There's a guy in that nation. His name is og of basian. We sing a song about how god defeats og of basian they found A bed or actually I don't know if they found it but in the scriptures. It says that his bed was 13 feet tall.

Now.

Egos aside. You probably wouldn't have a 13 foot bed if you're a six foot man. I'm sure that ego can play a factor here, but i'm assuming he was probably 12 feet. Hainanite king. It says there in deuteronomy 3 11 that his bed was 13 feet tall.

Numbers 13 33 it says that the people were like grasshoppers that the walls were thick and they could not penetrate them. We're talking about a group of people. That were horrifying and terrifying to the israelites and you can imagine you can sympathize with them.

Why this was such a problem. It says that these people were called anakim and rephaim, which means that and it says that they were the descendants of the nephilim. So if you buy into this what i'm sharing.

The giants that were there before the flood are now back again in the land of canaan which bears the mark of satanic activity. This is evidence that satan has been waging war. This is not the only evidence.

Canaan was a place of disgusting sins that weren't really the case in other places. Not like they were here. There was child sacrifice. And we mentioned this a lot. But I don't want it to become.

Um.

I don't want it to become something that we just overlook. They were literally murdering their infant babies and setting them on fire in order to appease what paul says is their demonic gods. There was ritual prostitution.

There was necromancy and witchcraft deuteronomy 18 10 through 11 leviticus 19. There was bestiality going on in canaan leviticus 18 23. There was rampant forms of demonic idolatry. There was extreme violence and torture among peoples.

There was blood magic and human sacrifice deuteronomy 12 31 psalm 106 37 through 38.

And.

There was homosexuality in a list like this. We should not wonder how pervasive and how abominable to god Homosexuality is. It's on the list of the things that show evidence that demonic activity is in your country.

You see later examples as well. Goliath of gath six cubits in a span. He was around nine feet tall. You see saul. Saul gives an edict to get rid of all the necromancers in Israel, why would he say that unless there were necromancers in the country?

You wouldn't say Get rid of all of the x if there was not x there. He says get rid of all the necromancers symbols of satan's activity. He also is possessed later in his life by a disturbing spirit. That david has to even play music from the lord in order to get saul to calm down in between bouts of him throwing spears.

At him.

You see saul decline into madness and kill himself. You see david who is directly tempted by satan duder. Our first chronicles 21 and one says then satan stood up against israel and moved david. To number them to give a census.

What i'm what i'm pointing out here. Satan's not omniscient. Satan's not omnipresent. Satan can't be in multiple places at one time. He was his headquarters was in canaan. This is the place where he was fighting and waging his war.

This is why solomon the wisest man that ever lived end of his life plunged into idolatry from foreign wives and idolatry. This is why you see the history of judah and israel on this roller coaster ride up and down where one king Is worshiping god and it says that he's a king after or just like his father david and then another king is putting his baby in the fire.

Like I can't remember. Was it asa? Someone. Manasseh it was manasseh. Canaan looks like a cosmic war because it was. Now the same is true in the new testament, maybe you haven't thought about this before but did you know that the most Concentrated passages in the bible that talk about the appearance of satan is matthew mark luke and john.

You get to the new testament and satan is everywhere the the demons are everywhere. It's like they realize like we don't need to think that they're dumb. Hey, jesus showed up. It's time for reinforcements to come so that by the time you get to the new testament satan is everywhere.

Okay, jesus is born herod's attacking trying to kill him. Yeah, that's satanic. You've got satan at jesus's early life attempting to Tempt jesus to to take him off his course. You've got unclean spirits who are shrieking at jesus as he passes by them.

Uh mark 124 what business do you we have with you jesus of nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? Yes, he has.

But.

Jesus casts out demons on almost every page. There's a man called legion who's lying among the tombs cutting himself. Who has an unknown number of demons in him that when he cast when jesus cast them out into a herd of pigs.

This was a big event. This would have made the news. You've got a boy who's throwing himself into the fire and the father's confused. How do we do this the disciples don't know how to cast out that demon?

You've got mary magdalene who's possessed by seven demons before she is a follower of christ. You've got the canaanite woman who says lord. My daughter has these demons in her. Will you get rid of them for me?

You've got Jesus calling the jews the children of satan. That's not again. That's not hyperbole. That's not jesus trying to one-up them with a stronger tweet. You've got the jews who are acting like satan.

You've got peter who jesus says get behind me satan. You've got judas who's possessed literally by satan. Everywhere in the gospels. You've got this warfare going on because satan is trying to do one thing.

He's trying to consolidate his empire. Every nation on earth belonged to satan except Canaan. Because god claimed it as his own. So from the moment god claimed canaan and made promises to abraham. Satan had been in war there.

We didn't talk about sodom and gomorrah. We didn't talk about tyrant sidon. There is a war for this country so that satan could consolidate his empire. And it is a war that will see him lose everything because Christ came to crush satan.

Christ came to defeat Satan, why do we think jesus was born in canaan? Literally, let's think about that. He could have been born anywhere. He could have died anywhere his his atonement would have still been effective.

He was born in canaan. Because god made covenant promises to those people. And he was born in canaan to defeat the works of the devil which were centralized.

There.

And at the cross Jesus began the defeat of this being called satan crushing his head just as Genesis 3 15 said that he would that he would crush the serpent's head and the serpent would bruise his heel.

That happened. Right then and there now, let's get back to revelation 12. Because revelation 12 gives us another layer to this. It says there that and she gave birth to a son a male child who was to rule all the nations with a rod of iron.

That's jesus. And her child was caught up to god and to his throne. That's the ascension. And there was war in heaven and michael and his angels waging war with the dragon and the dragon his angels waged war.

And they were not strong enough and there was no longer found a place for them. And the serpent of old who is called the devil and satan who deceives the whole world he was thrown down to earth. And his angels were thrown down with him and then I heard a loud voice saying now the salvation and the power and the kingdom of the Of our god and the authority of our christ have come for the accuser of our brethren has been thrown down.

And he who accuses them before our god day and night and they Overcame him because of the blood of the lamb and because of the word of their testimony and they did not love their life. Even when faced with death for this reason.

Rejoice oh heavens. And you who dwell in them? Woe to the earth and to the sea because the devil has come down to you having great wrath knowing that he only has a short time. Just a bit of a recap before we move on.

Brace yourselves. The devil was defeated at the cross the devil was crushed at the cross, but he didn't die there. He was wounded, but he didn't die there. How do we know that because he's in heaven the next verse later waging a war against jesus and The angels and it says that he was not powerful enough to overcome them and he was cast out of heaven and thrown down to the earth.

So he's not dead yet. Kind of like in monty python. I'm not dead yet. That was satan originally. That man only had a little time as well. It all fits together. Satan came down to earth and what I want us to see here is maybe something you've never heard before.

Satan came down to earth for a near-term showdown. Satan did not come down to earth to stay here for thousands and thousands of years. Because it says he has only a short time left. So we need to understand what that means.

We need to understand to understand what that means. We need to understand what the seven-headed dragon is. Why does the seven-headed dragon have ten horns? Why does one of these horns talk and have eyes?

And we need to understand what all of this means. Okay. This is what it says. When the dragon saw that he was thrown down to earth. He persecuted the woman who gave birth to the male child. Remember who the woman is.

The woman is the people of god. So satan cast down to the earth kicked out of heaven no longer able to accuse the saints is now Slithering back into jerusalem to make war with god's people. That's what's happening.

So you think about this. Jesus ascends to heaven. He tells the early church to sit in the upper room and wait for the holy spirit. Why does he tell them to wait it could be? That they're waiting on earth while jesus and the angels are at war in heaven.

And when jesus and the angels in war in heaven defeat the dragon. Then the holy spirit comes. It could be i'm not willing to say definitively on that. But it could be but what you don't have is you don't have hundreds if not thousands of years.

You've got ad -30 satan being thrown out of heaven thrown down to the earth and ready to make a final stand custard's last stand in jerusalem sort of moment. Where he has a definite period of time the text says that his time is short.

What does that mean? Short from when it was given. Not short from our perspective. It doesn't mean that his time is short in a general sense. Especially if you're old earth and you believe that the world is billions of years short could be hundreds of thousands.

That's not what it means. And if you're old earth, you should repent to that. Go today in sunday school class. He talks about it. Shameless plug man. You may say well in the bible though, doesn't it say that a day is like a thousand years and a thousand years.

It's like a day. Yeah, it does say that but it also in the book of revelation the time frame references are always literal. So out of all of the fantastic scenes in the book of revelation. You think about the dragon you think about the woman you think about all these things the time frame references are always Literal in the way that you and I would normally think what do I mean by that?

When revelation chapter one it says that that jesus is coming that the time is near that he's coming quickly. And it says that those who pierced jesus are going to see him coming in judgment against jerusalem.

Well, what does that mean you and I didn't pierce jesus. The very ones who pierced him in fulfillment of zechariah 10 are going to be the ones who see him coming. That was jerusalem. It says all the tribes of the land will see Him.

We live in a commonwealth. We don't live in a tribe. It was israel. That he was talking about At the end of the book. It says behold i'm coming quickly. The time is near the time frame references in revelation.

You can trust are the most literal parts of the book so that when it says that satan has a short time. And he will be defeated that he will be thrown into the lake of fire. Then you can believe that the time really was near and maybe you're like well I still think satan is prowling around like a roaring lion today.

I think satan is still attacking me today. I think satan is the reason why I yelled at that man in traffic. Well. Let me not prove my point from the book of revelation. Let me prove my point from your favorite theologian the apostle paul in the book of romans.

This is what paul says to the roman church the god of peace will soon Crush satan under your feet. And the grace of our lord jesus be with you, do you know that paul is writing this book in 58 ad? He's not talking about the god of peace will soon crush satan under every people's feet.

This is not a this is not a passage for all people at all times and at all places that we're all a part of this General crushing of satan. This is a passage to the roman church that the roman church is going to be a part of the crushing of satan.

In a near time window. What is that near time? I'm going to argue it's within 12 years of when paul gave it which makes a lot more sense of soon than thousands of years. Again this does not mean millennia.

The Seven-Headed Beast and Daniel 7's Four Kingdoms

The dragon in revelation 12 is identified as a seven-headed dragon. Now we need to move from the time frame reference to his identity. So that we can understand what's actually going on here. It says in verse 3 of chapter 12.