Revelation 12:7-17
Satan Thrown Out of Heaven
7 And war broke out in heaven: Michael and his angels fought with the dragon; and the dragon and his angels fought, 8 but they did not prevail, nor was a place found for them in heaven any longer. 9 So the great dragon was cast out, that serpent of old, called the Devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world; he was cast to the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.
10 Then I heard a loud voice saying in heaven, “Now salvation, and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of His Christ have come, for the accuser of our brethren, who accused them before our God day and night, has been cast down. 11 And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, and they did not love their lives to the death. 12 Therefore rejoice, O heavens, and you who dwell in them! Woe to the inhabitants of the earth and the sea! For the devil has come down to you, having great wrath, because he knows that he has a short time.”
The Woman Persecuted
13 Now when the dragon saw that he had been cast to the earth, he persecuted the woman who gave birth to the male Child. 14 But the woman was given two wings of a great eagle, that she might fly into the wilderness to her place, where she is nourished for a time and times and half a time, from the presence of the serpent. 15 So the serpent spewed water out of his mouth like a flood after the woman, that he might cause her to be carried away by the flood. 16 But the earth helped the woman, and the earth opened its mouth and swallowed up the flood which the dragon had spewed out of his mouth. 17 And the dragon was enraged with the woman, and he went to make war with the rest of her offspring, who keep the commandments of God and have the testimony of Jesus Christ.
When the war broke out in heaven, the dragon serpent Satan and those disobedient angels who followed him and rejected the authority of their Creator God were thrown out of God’s presence and kingdom (2 Peter 2:4, Jude 1:6) down to us here on earth to cause us further trouble, as if the temptation and fall of mankind was not enough for them. The victory in heaven in this battle was won by the archangel and defender of the realm Michael (Daniel 10:13, 21, Jude 1:9) and the angels loyal to their Maker still by His side in heaven. The result of the insurrection of the angels led by the deceiver of Eden was his exile to earth until the final judgment will imprison him and his minions forever in the torturous lake of fire (Matthew 25:41, Revelation 20:10) that God has already prepared for them to suffer forever for rejecting the Lord and His Christ and fighting against those who follow Him. The bad news for we humans is that if we likewise reject and rebel against the Lord God and His Christ, we will suffer the same eternal fate of suffering alongside them there if we do not turn from our sin to Him before we die (Hebrews 9:27-28). The message that John heard in this heavenly journey into the end of time where righteousness will rule at last on the earth is that God’s kingdom will come here in His strength to save us from our just judgment by His person and sacrificial work on the cross in eternal redemption and reconciliation! The power of Christ will come upon the world and the heavens to cast out our accuser forever, the one who constantly points out our sin before the Father and neglects to let us see the power of our redemption covering our sin forever in Christ (Matthew 25:46, 1 John 4:18) and keeping us from the eternal torment we deserve but that he and his unholy followers will get instead. We have and continue to overcome by the sacrificial blood of the Lamb of God and by the word of our testimony that agrees with the word of the gospel of Jesus Christ and His work alone for our righteousness and not our own sin which the accuser assails us with to bring doubt if he cannot keep us from saving belief to receive Christ. Do we truly not love our lives to the death in keeping this testimony? We have every reason to rejoice in Christ and our salvation along with the faithful angels in heaven. We see the woes of all those living here on earth under the sway of the wicked one (1 John 5:19) and see that he is out to war with we who hold to the gospel of our eternal salvation which he and his can no longer have any part in. Jesus was kept from the destruction of His work on the cross and we shall be likewise kept spiritually under the shadow of His wings until we meet the Lord in heaven before His throne of mercy and grace! We who are His understand the war by the fallen one against us in his rage at the defeat he already had obtained but still keep the commandments of God and our testimony of Jesus Christ as our hope and help in all things, no matter how terrible the end times become as the battle rages to the finish at last. He is our hope and eternal salvation who brings the earnest expectation of life before His face in the New Jerusalem to come to us here. May we who know these things of the war and our victory in Christ (1 Corinthians 15:57) therefore never lose sight of His power to save and grace to keep us as His forevermore!
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