Hello, I’m Daniel Westfall on the channel “Pray With Me”.
John’s vision in the Book of Revelation bounces between heaven where multitudes worship God and earth where unprecedented disasters occur.
In chapter 12, John’s vision shifts focus to signs appearing in the heavens. A pregnant woman, clothed with the sun, standing on the moon, and wearing a crown with twelve stars prepares to give birth to a son.
Remember Joseph in the Old Testament? With his coat of many colors? He had a dream that featured a similar cosmic background. When he told his brothers that the sun, moon, and stars bowed down to him, they said he was an arrogant jerk. “No way we’ll EVER bow to you” they said, and they sold him into the Egyptian slave trade. But God made the dream come true–Joseph became the #2 man in Egypt and saved his family, and the known world, from famine.
Do the sun and moon and stars in Revelation tell a similar story? Will Revelation’s child be a new Joseph, one who goes into slavery and rises to be king?
As the woman in John’s vision gives birth, a red dragon with seven crowned heads and ten horns waits to devour the baby. But the baby is snatched away and taken to God’s throne in heaven. Our new Joseph escapes the clutches of his enemies and his mother escapes to the wilderness for three-and-a-half years.
Sounds like the story of Jesus’ birth, where the dragon we know as Herod tried to kill him. And later that old dragon, Satan himself, arranged Christ’s crucifixion. But God restored Christ and set him on the throne of heaven.
His mother, Mary, however didn’t escape to the wilderness like the mother in John’s vision. Interpreters who insist on a clear identity for the mother in Revelation tie themselves in knots trying to determine if she’s Mary, the Israelites, or maybe the church.
Since my life is already tied in knots, I like flexible interpretations. The way I see it, the woman in John’s vision starts out as Mary giving birth to Jesus, and then she represents the church, the whole family of Jesus’ brothers and sisters who, with him, are targeted by modern-day Herods and spirit-dragons like Satan.
Back in the Book of Revelation, meanwhile, war breaks out in heaven. Michael and the good angels fight the dragon and his demonic army, throwing them down to earth.
That’s good news for heaven, but not so much for earth because earth is stuck with all the unhappy refugees: one angry and wounded dragon and his massive demonic army.
A voice in heaven says, “God’s salvation is coming. The dragon who accused God’s children has been thrown down. They conquered him by the blood of the lamb andby their testimony” (Rev 12:10-12).
But the dragon doesn’t believe he’s defeated. He was cheated out of the woman’s first child, so he plots revenge on the rest of the family–those who obey God’s commandments and hold the testimony of Jesus (Rev 12:17).
Let’s pray.
Our father, we are participants in the war between good and evil. We feel the dragons that pursue us:
… a culture of sex and consumerism and violence,
… leaders who perpetrate war and kill those who oppose them,
… our own hearts that love darkness more than light.
We hear the promise of John’s vision, that you, O God, are bringing salvation. The dragon is defeated. We can conquer him by the blood of the lamb and the word of our testimony.
Help us live into this promise of salvation, not to rely not on politics or philosophy to defeat evil, but on your word, spoken through the death of the lamb and the testimony of our faith.
Amen.
I’m Daniel, on the channel “Pray with Me”.
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