Revelation 12:1: “Now a great sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a garland of 12 stars.”
In Genesis 3:9-10, Joseph told Israel his father, “I have dreamed another dream. And this time, the sun, the moon, and the eleven stars bowed down to me.” Israel rebuked Joseph and said to him, “What is this dream that you have dreamed? Shall your mother and I and your brothers indeed come to bow down to the earth before you?”
In Joseph’s dream from the Lord, the sun represents his father, the moon his mother, and the eleven stars his brothers. The woman in Revelation 12:1 represents the 12 tribes of Israel through whom God gave to the world His Son. Jesus Christ is the Word of God made flesh.
The Lord says in Jeremiah 31:21-22, “Set up signposts, make landmarks... O virgin of Israel... for the Lord has created a new thing in the earth—a woman shall compass [סָבַב] a man.” A virgin with a “man” inside her is a sign that God is doing something new in the earth.
In Isaiah 7:14, the prophet told King Ahaz, “The Lord Himself shall give you a sign: Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a Son, and shall call His name Immanuel [God with us].”
The woman represents God’s Bride. In Isaiah 54:5, God says to Israel, “Your Maker is your husband.” In Isaiah 62:5, God compares His joy over His people to a bridegroom rejoicing over a bride. In Jeremiah 2:2 and Hosea 2:19-20, God calls Israel His betrothed. In Matthew 25:1-10, Jesus compares those who enter the kingdom of God to wise virgins waiting for their bridegroom to arrive. In 2 Corinthians 11:2, Paul speaks of Christians as promised to one husband, even to Christ. In Ephesians 5:25-32, Paul compares the relationship between a husband and wife to the sacrificial love of Christ for the Church. In Revelation 21:2, 9, New Jerusalem comes down from heaven prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.
Revelation 12:2: “Then being with child, she cried out in labor and in pain to give birth.”
In Isaiah 7:14 and Matthew 1:23, the child that the woman gives birth to is the Messiah. His is called “Emmanuel” which means God with us.
In Isaiah 66:7-8, God asks, “Who has ever heard of such things? Who has ever seen things like this? Can a country be born in a day or a nation be brought forth in a moment? Yet no sooner is Zion in labor, than she gives birth to her children.” In an earthly sense, this passage refers to Israel becoming a nation once again in 1948. In a spiritual sense, it speaks of the people of Israel being reborn, this time with the life of Jesus Messiah within them.
In John 3:3-8, Jesus told Nicodemus that the Kingdom of God is birthed inside a person when the Holy Spirit like a wind blows upon them. According to 1 Peter 2:9-10, a person is spiritually reborn and becomes a citizen of God’s Kingdom on the day he or she believes in Jesus Christ. Such a person is born again. Transformed by God’s power!
Revelation 12:3: “And another sign appeared in heaven: behold, a great, fiery red dragon having seven heads and ten horns, and seven diadems on his heads.”
In Daniel 7:7, the Lord showed Daniel a fourth beast that was dreadful and exceedingly strong. It devoured what the previous three beasts (empires) left behind. It had 10 horns. In Daniel 7:24, the Lord told Daniel that the ten horns are ten kings.
In Revelation 17:3-14, the Lord shows John a scarlet beast full of blasphemous names. It has seven heads and ten horns. The seven heads are defined as seven kings. The ten horns are defined as ten kings. The Babylonian empire of the last days rides on the back of the seven kings, and the ten kings give their power and authority to the beast. They make war with the Lamb but the Lamb [Christ] overcomes them.
The sign of the fiery red dragon lets us know that Satan is the instigator and source of the evil activities of the last days’ Babylonian empire against God and His people on earth.
Revelation 12:4: “His tail drew a third of the stars of heaven and threw them to the earth. And the dragon stood before the woman who was ready to give birth, to devour her child as soon as it was born.”
In Daniel 8:9-10, a little horn grows toward the Glorious Land. It reaches the host of heaven, and casts some of the host down and tramples on them.
In Revelation 12:4, the dragon’s tail withdraws a third of the stars of heaven and casts them down to earth. In Revelation 12:9, the devil is cast out from heaven to earth. “His angels were cast out with him.” In Revelation 1:20, angelic messengers are symbolized by stars. The devil persuaded a third of the angels to rebel against God.
In Matthew 2:13-18, after Christ was born of Mary, the devil wants to devour Him, but an angel warned Joseph in a dream to arise and flee to Egypt (a wilderness). The devil’s plot was to use a king (Herod) to kill Jesus Messiah.
The preservation of Jesus from Herod is reminiscent of God’s miraculous preservation of Moses from Pharaoh in Exodus 2:1-10. Pharoah, whose name means crocodile, demanded that the people of Israel drown their newborn baby boys in the river, but God used Pharoah’s own daughter to find baby Moses, adopt him and raise him as her own son.
In Daniel 8:11, “the horn” exalts himself against “the Prince of the host” which is Jesus Messiah.
In Daniel 8:12, “Because of transgression, an army was given over to the horn” by the which he stops “the daily sacrifices” and destroys the place pf the Lord’s sanctuary. He casts truth down to the ground.
In 2 Thessalonians 2:3-4, 9-10, Paul wrote of a falling away from the Lord in the last days. A man of sin will be revealed. He “opposes and exalts himself above all that is called God or that is worshipped, so that he sits as God in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God.” “The coming of the lawless one is according to the working of Satan, with all power, signs, and lying wonders, and with all unrighteous deception among those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved.”
Those who love and keep God’s Word, which is the truth, are not swept away by Satan’s lies.
Revelation 12:5: “She bore a male child who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron. And her child was caught up to God and His throne.”
The child she bore was Jesus Christ. He rules “all nations with a rod of iron.” Jesus rules with a rod that does not bend or break. In Revelation 19:15, a sharp sword goes out of His mouth and strikes the nations. Jesus treads the winepress of the fierceness of God’s wrath.
In Exodus 4:17, the Lord told Moses to take a rod in his hand. With it he would do signs. In Exodus 7:17-20, as he struck the waters of Egypt with it, they turned to blood. With the rod of God in his hand, the proud nation of Egypt was shattered. The rod represents authority to rule.
“Her child was caught up to God and His throne.” In Mark 16:19, after Jesus completed His mission on earth, He ascended to heaven.
Revelation 12:6: “Then the woman fled into the wilderness, where she has a place prepared by God, that they should feed her there 1,260 days.”
In Matthew 2:13, God preserved the child Jesus and His mother by leading Joseph to take them to Egypt (the wilderness). In Matthew 2:19, after King Herod died, the Lord led Joseph to bring them back to the land of Israel.
In 1 Samuel 27, David lived among the Philistines for a time to avoid being slain by King Saul.
According to Romans 9-11, Jesus Christ abides among the Gentiles until the last days when the Jews open their hearts to Him and want Him to reign over them. The good news of the last days is that the Jewish people will turn in great numbers to faith in Yeshua Ha Mashiach.
Revelation 12:7-9: “And war broke out in heaven. Michael and his angels fought with the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought, but they did not prevail, nor was a place found for them in heaven any longer. 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.”
Various passages of the Bible speak of Satan being cast out from God’s presence. In Matthew 25:41, Jesus said, “Depart from Me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.” In Luke 10:18, Jesus states, “I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven.” In 2 Peter 2:4, it is written, “God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell...” In Isaiah 14:14, the devil said, “I will make myself like the Most High.” But in Isaiah 14:15, the Lord said to him, “But you are brought down... to the far reaches of the pit.” In Revelation 20:10, the devil is thrown into the lake of burning brimstone to be tormented there forever.
He “who deceives the whole world” “was cast to the earth, and his angels with him.” In John 12:31, while speaking of His death, Jesus declared, “Now is the judgment of this world. Now will the ruler of this world be cast out.” The death of Christ on the cross, removed the handwriting against humanity because Jesus paid the ransom for our souls.
Sin was the devil’s access point to destroy our souls. In Hebrews 2:14, we read, “Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, He Himself likewise partook of the same things, that through death He might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil.” In 1 John 3:8, we read, “The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil.”
According to Romans 16:20, “The God of peace shall bruise Satan under your feet shortly.”
Revelation 12:10: “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.’”
In Zechariah 3:1-2, the Lord gave to Zechariah a vision of Satan accusing Joshua the high priest. An angel said to Satan, “The Lord rebuke you, O Satan!” In Zechariah 3:4, the angel said to those next to Joshua, “Remove the filthy garments from him.” The Lord said to Joshua, “I have taken your iniquity away from you, and I will clothe you with pure vestments.”
Satan may accuse us, but his accusations are meaningless because God has forgiven us, justified us and glorified us. In Romans 8:31-34, Paul wrote, “If God be for us, who can be against us? He that spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things? Who shall lay anything to the charge of God’s elect? It is God that justifies. Who is he that condemns? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us.”
Revelation 12:11: “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.”
In Revelation 12:11, the Lord gives us three keys to overcoming the devil’s attacks. First, rebuke Satan, because the precious blood of Christ has been shed for your redemption. Second, recite the promises contained in God’s Word over you. For example, “I am honored, precious, and loved by God. I am my Beloved’s and He is mine.” Third, and last, whether or not the Lord delivers my physical body from the fiery furnace, I will not give my soul to any other god.
Revelation 12:12: “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.”
In Job 2:2, when the Lord asked Satan, “From where have you come?” Satan replied, “From going to and fro on the earth...” In 1 Peter 5:8, Peter warned, “Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.” Thus, it is good to pray as the Lord taught us to pray, “Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.”
Revelation 12:13: “Now when the dragon saw that he had been cast to the earth, he persecuted the woman who gave birth to the male child.”
The devil persecutes those who profess Christ. He does this through those whom he controls. In Psalms 37:12-14, the Psalmist put it this way, “The wicked plots against the just, and gnashes upon him with his teeth. ...to slay such as be of upright conversation.”
Revelation 12:14: “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.”
In Exodus 19:4, the Lord said to Israel, “You have seen what I did unto the Egyptians, and how I bare you on eagles’ wings, and brought you unto Myself.” In Isaiah 40:31, “They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.”
The wings symbolize God’s helping hands to preserve the life of His servants. In Isaiah 49:16, the Lord says, “See, I have inscribed you on the palms of My hands.”
Revelation 12:15-16: “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. 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.”
The enemy tries to overwhelm God’s people with a flood a trials, but the Lord says to us in Isaiah 59:19, “When the enemy shall come in like a flood, the Spirit of the Lord shall lift up a standard against him.” The standard that God raises against the enemy’s flood are His promises recorded in the Bible. According to John 14:26, the Holy Spirit brings God’s Word to our mind.
Revelation 12:17, “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.”
The woman is the bride of Christ. We who are in Christ are her offspring. We keep God’s commandments [the Law] and the testimony of Jesus Christ [the Gospel]. We speak the Law to convict sinners that they need God’s forgiveness, and the Gospel to tell them He forgives them.
Yes, the devil is at war with Christ and us His followers, but we know who wins. Christ has already revealed to us in the Book of Revelation the happy ending of our story.
