Revelation 12:11

 

 

And they [the Saints] overcame him [the devil] 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.

 

How important is this victory in the overall plan of God?

 

What if we were to say it was the reason He created all things?

 

What if we were to say it was part of His eternal purpose in Christ?

 

Would that be excessive and unbiblical?  Or would it be merely what Ephesians 3:9-11 says?

Ephesians 3:9-11   and to bring to light what is the administration of the mystery which for ages has been hidden in God who created all things;  so that the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known through the church to the rulers and the authorities in the heavenly places.  This was in accordance with the eternal purpose which He carried out in Christ Jesus our Lord . . .

It would probably be well to just stop here for a while and let the magnitude of Ephesians 3:9-11 sink in.  The idea that God created all things --- including the church --- in order to demonstrate His wisdom through the church to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places --- and this is part of His eternal purpose in Christ --- is staggering to consider.

 

Perhaps the fact that over two-thirds of the book of Revelation is devoted to the last three and one-half years of the age during which the crisis of this demonstration of God’s wisdom through the church will take place should give us a clue to the importance of this time.

 

And, as always, the enemy is right there to steal the significance of that time away from the church by suggesting that the church is not even in view after Revelation 4, having been raptured away.  Of course if the church is not here, there’s not much sense worrying about the Saints in Revelation 12:11 --- they must be someone else since we will be gone.  Maybe these are those who come to faith once the true church is raptured away.

 

Such theology keeps us from appropriating what seems nothing less than the final and victorious lap of the church’s ongoing battle against Satan --- that part of the battle which sees the Saints victorious over Satan by the blood of the Lamb, the word of their testimony, and by loving not their lives unto death.

 

Is this a non-essential doctrinal slip or is this lack of understanding the main reason why Jesus said many would fall away from the faith and the love of most would grow cold during the last three and one-half years of the age?  Are we, the church, oblivious to our glorious calling in which the devil will be defeated as we walk the final three and one-half years as Jesus’ corporate body?

 

I find there is often a dull silence when this vision is presented to the saints.  There seems to be no willingness or understanding at all.  It’s as if the book of Revelation is a completely closed book.

 

Father, open our eyes to Your glorious call for Your end-times church.  Open the book of Revelation to us that we might understand our destiny.