Revelation 12

A Gospel Age Overview

The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show his servants what must soon take place. He made it known by sending his angel to his servant John. — Revelation 1:1 (NIV)

A verse by verse study of Revelation 12

The revelation of those things which “must soon take place” describe events that would occur during a 2,000-year period we call the Gospel age. The first half of the book of Revelation contains the messages to the seven churches, the opening of the seven seals, and the sounding of the seven trumpets. These all describe the events of the Gospel age from different perspectives. The last half of Revelation is concerned with the events that end the Gospel age. Because the entire book is written in symbolic language, it definitely does not literally mean what it says. There is no better example of that than chapter 12 which also describes the entire Gospel age.

Understanding this chapter requires a basic understanding of the symbols sun, moon, stars, heaven, dragon, “Michael,” and water. To consider any of these as meaning exactly what they literally describe will not reveal the beauty of revelation which God gave to Jesus Christ and who in turn described it in vision to John (Revelation 1:10).

This chapter describes a woman who, in the pains of child birth, is confronted by a dragon who wants to destroy her child. The child is a son and is whisked away to safety. A battle between the dragon and this son occurs and the dragon is defeated. A voice from “heaven” declares that salvation has come, but the woman who is on earth must go into the wilderness to escape from the dragon. As a last resort the dragon attempts to destroy the woman with a flood of water, but she is not harmed.

The Woman—Revelation 12:1,2

“And there appeared a great wonder in heaven; a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars: and she being with child cried, travailing in birth, and pained to be delivered.”

This woman is “clothed with the sun.” When John received the revelation, he described the countenance of “one like unto the Son of man . . . as the sun shineth in his strength” (Revelation 1:13,16). Thus the woman has the enlightenment of Jesus Christ (she is “clothed” with it). She stands on the moon which has no light of its own; it only reflects light it receives from the sun. We are told that the priests in the tabernacle arrangement “serve unto the example and shadow of heavenly things” (Hebrews 8:5). The Jerusalem Bible renders Hebrews 10:1, “Since the Law has no more than a reflection of these realities and no finished picture of them, it is quite incapable of bringing the worshipers to perfection.” So the woman is grounded in the Jewish Law arrangement but is not herself under it. A “star” refers to a bright luminary in the religious or ecclesiastical world. Jude, for example, refers to ungodly men as “wandering stars” (Jude 13). The woman has “a crown of twelve stars,” clearly a reference to the 12 apostles of the Lamb (Revelation 21:14).

Who is this woman? She is the true church at the beginning of the Gospel age. She is the one who Isaiah says “shall renew their strength, [who] shall mount up with wings as eagles” (Isaiah 40:31). Eagles’ wings will be used by this woman in verse 14. The early church is in the process of producing something which is conveyed by saying she is “with child.”*

The Dragon—Revelation 12:3,4

“And there appeared another wonder in heaven; and behold a great red dragon, having seven heads and ten horns, and seven crowns upon his heads. And his tail drew the third part of the stars of heaven, and did cast them to the earth: and the dragon stood before the woman which was ready to be delivered, for to devour her child as soon as it was born.”

This is the first occurrence of the word “dragon” in the New Testament. It comes from a Greek word that is used only in the book of Revelation. This dragon is not in the heaven that is God’s literal dwelling place. It is in the “heaven” that Peter says is “reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men” (2 Peter 3:7). This “heaven” describes the place of religious control over mankind. At the time of the early church, what could be said about the state of the religious world? The fourth universal empire, ruled by a succession of Roman emperors, controlled the world, and it was pagan. It intended to put down anyone that might arise to challenge its power. The powerful from time immemorial have always done whatever it takes to retain their power against any threat, real or imagined. Herod, whose power was but a shadow of Caesar’s, slew all those two years and younger in Bethlehem thinking that would erase a possible threat to his personal power (Matthew 2:16).

The dragon as a symbol represents civil power both in this chapter and all other places the symbol appears in Revelation (13:2,4,11; 16:13; 20:2). This dragon is not the personal devil although the devil does use civil power for his purposes. When Peter urged our Lord notto go to Jerusalem to be crucified, Jesus said, “Get thee behind me Satan” (Matthew 16:23). He recognized that at that moment Satan was using Peter in an attempt to control him. At the time of the early church, civil power was in absolute control of both religious and secular life. The “dragon” was in “heaven.”

The Battle—Revelation 12:5-9

“And she brought forth a man child, who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron: and her child was caught up unto God, and to his throne. And the woman fled into the wilderness, where she hath a place prepared of God, that they should feed her there a thousand two hundred and threescore days. And there was war in heaven: Michael and his angels fought against the dragon; and the dragon fought and his angels, and prevailed not; neither was their place found any more in heaven. And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.”

When the child comes forth, it is caught up “unto God and to his throne.” But this is not literally heaven because the woman is not there with her son. She must flee into a wilderness condition for 1,260 “days.” These “days,” of course, are not literal. In the symbolism of Scripture each symbolic “day” represents one literal year (see Numbers 14:34; Ezekiel 4:6). While the son prepares to “rule all nations with a rod of iron,” the “woman” must spend 1,260 literal years in the wilderness. This is similar to the experience of Elijah who had to hide himself from Jezebel for three and a half years, some of which time was in the wilderness where he was fed by ravens (1 Kings 17:4).

Michael is the name of the archangel (Jude 9); it is a name used by Daniel as a title of a spirit being (Daniel 10:13,21; 12:1). But that does not mean that the archangel is here fighting against the dragon because the name is similarly being used as a symbol. The “heaven” in which this battle is being waged is the ecclesiastical heaven. The Hebrew word Michael means “Who (is) like God” (Strongs #4317). The force opposing pagan Rome would win the battle; civil power would no longer dictate religious thought. That would become the right of the one who has set himself up as God, the pope. Papal Rome replaced pagan Rome.

According to John the false Christian church came out from the true church: “Little children, it is the last hour, and, according as you hear that the antichrist is coming, now also there have come to be many antichrists, whence we know that it is the last hour. Out of us they come, but they were not of us, for if they were of us, they would have remained with us. But it was that they may be manifested that they are not all of us. And you have an anointing from the Holy One, and all are aware” (1John 2:18-20, Concordant translation; emphasis added).

In Matthew 13:24-30 Jesus gave the parable of the wheat and the tares. The field of activity, which was expected to bring forth only wheat, in fact brought forth both weeds and wheat, both a bad and a good “crop.” This has been an accurate description of the events of the Gospel age. There has been a true church during this period, but there has also been a false church as well.

After losing this battle, civil power was confined to secular matters, those things that happened on the “earth” as opposed to “heaven.” Satan was directing civil power, of course, just as he “pulled the strings” of the rulers of ecclesiastical power, the pope and the church system of which he was the head.

Paul calls this false system the “man of sin” (2 Thessalonians 2:3). Commenting upon the man of sin, Pastor Charles Russell has written: “These various appellations and brief descriptions [of the man of sin] indicate a base, subtle, hypocritical, deceptive, tyrannical and cruel character, developed in the midst of the Christian Church; at first creeping in and up very gradually, then rapidly ascending in power andinfluence until it reaches the very pinnacle of earthly power, wealth, and glory—meanwhile exerting its influence against the truth, and against the saints, and for its own aggrandizement, claiming, to the last, peculiar sanctity and authority and power from God.” (Studies in the Scriptures, vol. 2, p. 272.)

The Proclamation—Revelation 12:10-12

“And I heard a loud voice saying in heaven, Now is come salvation, and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of his Christ: for the accuser of our brethren is cast down, which accused them before our God day and night. And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony; and they loved not their lives unto the death. Therefore rejoice, ye heavens, and ye that dwell in them. Woe to the inhabiters of the earth and of the sea! for the devil is come down unto you, having great wrath, because he knoweth that he hath but a short time.”

The “heaven” is the same here as it has been up to this point. The “loud voice” emanates from the ecclesiastic heaven and it is the voice of papacy claiming that because of their past faithfulness, they have the right to rule as Christ’s vicegerent. It is the counterfeit kingdom that was to reign for a period of 1,260 literal years during the time when the woman, the true church, had to remain in a wilderness condition.

The rejoicing in the “heavens” is a condition only for those associated with the apostate church. For those who are not a part of this system, it is a message of woe. As we know from history the false church system actually used civil power (the dragon) to enforce its power and control over the people.

The Woman’s Persecution—Revelation 12:13-17

“And when the dragon saw that he was cast unto the earth, he persecuted the woman which brought forth the man child. And to the woman were given two wings of a great eagle, that she might fly into the wilderness, into her place, where she is nourished for a time, and times, and half a time, from the face of the serpent. And the serpent cast out of his mouth water as a flood after the woman, that he might cause her to be carried away of the flood. And the earth helped the woman, and the earth opened her mouth, and swallowed up the flood which the dragon cast out of his mouth. And the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ.”

Many commentators on the book of Revelation measure the period of the reign of the false church from 539 to 1799. The Pope had been left in control of Rome in 538, and in 539 the threatening Goths were defeated at their stronghold Ravenna. The Pope was taken from Rome by the French in 1798, and he died as a prisoner in France in 1799, leaving Papacy temporarily headless. This was the beginning of the end for the false church system. The French Revolution which broke out in 1789 broke a spell of darkness and initiated a great flood of truth on many subjects. Water is a symbol of truth. “Whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life” (John 4:14).

The French Revolution marks the start of a flood of truth throughout the earth, especially the truth consisting of the Scriptures themselves. The first of several Bible societies was formed in England in1803 and had the objective of placing God’s word in the hands of the common people. Today the Bible has been translated into all the written languages of the earth. The “dragon” (civil power) thought to injure the true church by a great increase of knowledge on many subjects such as science, sociology, medicine, and education. But the “earth”—meaning of course the people living in the earth —embraced all of these truths and it proved to be a blessing, not a curse.

The final verse describes a war between civil power and the “remnant of [the woman’s] seed.” Since the interpretation of prophecy is best understood after it is fulfilled, we cannot be sure just how civil power will afflict the true church at the end of the Gospel age.

So we see from this brief chapter found in the middle of the book of Revelation that what began as a time of great distress for the true church did not result in permanent harm. God’s protecting power has remained over her through this long and difficult period when ecclesiastical and secular power would have liked to wipe her away. From our vantage point in history, we can see that the best course was to never grow weary in well doing because God’s time table was not man’s. May we similarly maintain our confidence steadfast unto the end even though the time for the full establishment of the kingdom seems to tarry. We know it will not really tarry (Habakkuk 2:3).