Can I pray for you in any way?
Send any prayer requests to TheChristianWalkPrayers@gmail.com.
In Christ, Mark
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
** Follow The Christian Walk on Twitter @ThChristianWalk
** Like posts and send friend requests to the author of The Christian Walk, Mark Cummings on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/mark.cummings.733?ref=tn_tnmn
** Become a Follower of The Christian Walk at http://the-christian-walk.blogspot.com
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.
When the dragon saw that he had been hurled to the earth, he pursued the woman who had given birth to the male child. The woman was given the two wings of a great eagle, so that she might fly to the place prepared for her in the wilderness, where she would be taken care of for a time, times and half a time, out of the serpent’s reach. Then from his mouth the serpent spewed water like a river, to overtake the woman and sweep her away with the torrent. But the earth helped the woman by opening its mouth and swallowing the river that the dragon had spewed out of his mouth. Then the dragon was enraged at the woman and went off to wage war against the rest of her offspring—those who keep God’s commands and hold fast their testimony about Jesus.
Revelation 12:13-17
This ends this reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.
It has been quite a past little more than a year for the nation of Israel. It started with a horrifically evil terror attack by the terrorist group Hamas, an attack that led to the murder of around 1,200 Israelis including the killing of children and the burning of entire families. Additionally, 240 Israelites were taken hostage, many of which died in Gaza while in custody. A recent ceasefire agreement includes the release of those who have survived, some 14 long months after abduction.
Now, this would have been bad enough in and of its own right but after taking action to retaliate and defend itself, Israel was vilified on the public stage and its other enemies took advantage by launching their own attacks on the nation, many of which were by way of drones and missiles. Those enemies included the aforementioned Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis, and Iran who is known to have funded the other entities who serve as proxies.
Incredibly, through it all, Israel has come out relatively unscathed since launching its initiatives to defend itself against any other major losses like experienced on the 6th of October in 2023. Perhaps its enemies should have made themselves more familiar with the Word of God where we find these words regarding the Lord’s promised protection of His people:
Blessed are you, Israel! Who is like you, a people saved by the Lord?
He is your shield and helper and your glorious sword. Deuteronomy 33:29
Go back to Old Testament days through the present and you will find Satan hard at work to go after and destroy God’s people. The prior mentioned enemies would like nothing more to obliterate Israel and so they plot and scheme as if they can be successful. Satan speaks to them this way and convinces them it is possible when it is really impossible. This is why Jesus calls him the father of lies in the Bible (John 8:44).
Yes, the ultimate destruction of Israel will never happen but we need to know that the devil is never going to give up and as we see in today’s passage from the closing verses of Revelation 12, his efforts to eliminate Israel will continue even into the future Tribulation period. Look again at these words:
When the dragon saw that he had been hurled to the earth, he pursued the woman who had given birth to the male child. The woman was given the two wings of a great eagle, so that she might fly to the place prepared for her in the wilderness, where she would be taken care of for a time, times and half a time, out of the serpent’s reach. Then from his mouth the serpent spewed water like a river, to overtake the woman and sweep her away with the torrent. But the earth helped the woman by opening its mouth and swallowing the river that the dragon had spewed out of his mouth. Then the dragon was enraged at the woman and went off to wage war against the rest of her offspring—those who keep God’s commands and hold fast their testimony about Jesus. Vv. 13-17
Fresh off his defeat from the war in Heaven, a war where the archangel Michael won victory over Satan before evicting him from Heaven and hurling him to the earth, we find the devil, depicted as a great dragon, fixing his sights back on Israel, the woman who had given birth to Jesus in front of the dragon who wished to kill him only to see God snatch up his Son for protection. The woman was dispatched into the wilderness right before Michael and Satan battled.
And so here, we find Satan, angered by his defeat, refocus his attention on the woman (Israel) only to see God once intervene to bring protection. The scriptures tell us He gave the woman “two wings of a great eagle” so that she could “fly to the place prepared for her in the wilderness”, a place “where she would be taken care of for a time, times and half a time” while “out of the serpent’s reach”.
How long is “a time, times and half a time”?
Essentially, a “time” is one year and your can do the math after that. “Times” is two years and a “half a time” then becomes a half a year. So when ushers Israel off into His protection, it will be for three and a half years which is the second half of the Tribulation period, a period that will find the Beast (the Antichrist) setting up an image of himself in the temple in Jerusalem.
As the passage in Revelation 12 concludes, we find Satan make one last attempt to stop the fleeing woman (Israel), spewing water from his mouth “like a river” which he hoped would “overtake the woman” and “sweep her away with the torrent”. But again, God caused the earth to open its mouth and swallow the river sent forth from Satan. The end result was that the woman (Israel) escaped to safety.
Satan had failed again to win against God and yet, he still wouldn’t accept his losses. For the scriptures tell us that he was “enraged” over missing out on killing the woman (Israel) and so he decided to “wage war against the rest of her offspring” who were defined as “those who keep God’s commands and hold fast their testimony about Jesus”.
The overall take away from this twelfth chapter of Revelation is that Satan doesn’t give up, no matter how many times God has thwarted his plans. Whether it’s the attempts to go after Israel since 10/6/23 or what seems to be daily assaults on all Christian believers each and every day, our enemy will never rest until he is ultimately defeated and cast into the depths and darkness of Hell, a time that isn’t far ahead as we end our study of chapter 12.
Amen.
In Christ,
Mark
PS: Feel free to leave a comment and please share this with anyone you feel might be blessed by it. Send any prayer requests to TheChristianWalkPrayers@gmail.com.
No comments:
Post a Comment