David Pawson - Revelation Part 4a

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THOUGHTFUL THOUGHTS  BY JOHN DUNNING 19.6.26; REVELATION Pt.4a

REVELATION Ch. 12-15…  “The Time Of Big Trouble”.

1). INTRODUCTION

The simplest understanding of these chapters is that Jesus warns His followers that they will face severe persecution in “The Time Of Big Trouble” (or the ‘great tribulation’) at the end of time… So we are going to go through what Jesus said about it… 

Revelation is more challenging to understand than other books and needs more time. So some homework is necessary… My grandmother taught me that the basics of doing jigsaw puzzles is to complete all the edging first. What we will do here is to start with what we know… There are some things that have already been explained, which we look at next…

2). Satan is thrown out of heaven by angels. REVELATION 12

a). There are some who can’t get their head around Revelation, like Luther, Zwingli, Calvin, and others never got to grips with Revelation, and dismissed the message that Jesus was giving to John, to pass on to us. 

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b). Then there are those who have twisted the message to fit around their own doctrines, but Jesus warned in Revelation 22:18-19 of the dangers of doing that. 

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c). The answer is for us to know other books of  the Bible better… Familiarity with the book of Daniel is a prime example of that. It helps with understanding Revelation, and now more is being understood about Revelation as we approach the end. 

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d). Some things are explained within the passage, and so some things have been interpreted for us. For example;-

i). We are told here that the dragon is Satan (12:9). The angels fought against the dragon and cast him out of heaven to the earth, and verse 12 tells us that the earth will suffer because of that.

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ii). Satan knows his end is near (12:12) and therefore throws everything he can at believers on the earth while he still can, (12:12). 

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iii). Soon Satan won’t be able to do any more harm, but in the meantime, God provides a place of safety for His own disciples…

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3). Satan’s mark is put on everyone without God’s mark. REVELATION 13.

a). 13:1-10 A beast…

A powerful religious leader, (the beast), emerges, who Satan gives great power to. Everyone on earth will worship this figure except those belonging to the Lamb, v.8. God’s people must endure and keep on persevering, v.10b.

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b). 13:11-18 A man…

Then another powerful religious figure emerges who does magic tricks and who makes people worship the first beast, but who is only a man. V.18, (represented by the number 666, which represents man.)

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c). The “mark”...

At this time, believers will be identified as those REFUSING Satan’s mark, (13:16-18).

i).  God’s terror will fall on those siding with the evil one. 

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ii). God’s terror will not affect those choosing to wear God’s own mark of ownership, which God will put on His own people, (Ch.7:3). His terrors will not hurt them. Compare that with what happened in ancient Egypt to God’s people when blood was put above the doorposts of God’s people. The angels passed by the doors that had been identified as belonging to God’s people. The blood on the doorposts protected the occupants from God’s judgment coming on the Egyptians. In other words, in Revelation Jesus is giving His church a “heads up” of what is to come. 

REVELATION 14

a). The Lamb and the 144,000. (Revelation 14:1-5).

An amazing choir follows the Lamb wherever He goes. It is made up of 144,000 humans who had lived lives for their Lord on earth which were sacrificial and selfless. (By way of illustration, John the Baptist was highly commended by Jesus.) They were so devoted to their Lord that they were single-minded and totally devoted. These were the ones that the Lord wanted to have in His worship team. They had not sought a life for themselves – but to live solely for God. 

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b). The Three Angels. (Revelation 14:6-13).

Angel 1 – An angel will make sure that the Gospel is proclaimed worldwide…

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Angel 2 – Another angel proclaims the fall of Babylon. Babylon had once been a city, but subsequently ended up being used as a word to describe totally corrupt places. It is used repeatedly in scripture to define one city after another that was corrupt. 

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Angel 3 – A third angel warns that anyone who takes the mark of the beast has put themselves squarely on the side of evil and will go to the place reserved for the evil one. 

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Rev. 14:12-13 is in the period of the “great tribulation” and so Jesus said, “Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord, from now on”…

Question: Who are the people who are being so faithful to Jesus during this tribulation period, that they are prepared to witness for the Lord at the cost of their lives.

Answer: Only believers are ever labeled as those who “die in the Lord”, and only believers would remain so faithful to Jesus, that they would continue to stand up for Him even to martyrdom. Jesus promises that they will be “blessed”. 

It is a very special encouragement being given to disciples of Jesus who are right in the middle of the ‘great tribulation’. So we see that Jesus said His disciples would be persecuted during the ‘great tribulation’.

5). The end is nigh! REVELATION 14:14-15:8.

Rev. 14:14-20.

a). Jesus comes in a white cloud and,

b). angels separate out those destined for God’s wrath. 

Rev. 15:1-8

c). Seven angels with seven plagues.

1-8 The seven plagues are the wrath of God being poured out.

Seven more plagues provide warnings to man to repent before it’s too late, but these warnings are running out. (Compare the warnings God gave to Israel before their exile.)

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6). EPILOGUE

In Revelation, Jesus warns believers to keep on, keeping on, by not becoming discouraged and giving up on their faith. That is a good enough reason for reading Revelation yourself. 

One of the early church leaders (between AD150 - AD250) wrote the following to describe the many persecuted disciples of Jesus:-

“As citizens, they share in all things with others and yet endure all things, as if they were foreigners. 

“Every foreign land is to them as their native country and every land of their birth as a land of strangers. 

“They pass their days on earth, but they are citizens of heaven…

“They dwell in their own countries, but simply as sojourners.”

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Do share this study with your friends…

This is John Dunning signing off from “Thoughtful Thoughts” for another week.

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