I want to take just a minute
and read this, Revelation 12, verses 1-17, because I think
it will help us just reading it. There appeared a great wonder
in heaven, a woman clothed in the sun, with the sun, and the
moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars. And she, being with the child,
cried, travailing in birth, and paying to be delivered. And there
appeared another wonder in heaven, and, behold, a great red dragon,
having seven heads and ten horns, and seven crowns upon his head.
And his tail drew the third part of the stars of heaven, and cast
them to the earth. And the dragon stood before the
woman, which was ready to be delivered, to devour her child
as soon as it was born. And she brought forth a man-child,
who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron. And her child
was called up unto God, and to his throne. And the woman fled
into the wilderness, where she had a place prepared of God,
that they should feed her there a thousand two hundred and sixty
days. And there was war in heaven,
and Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon
fought against his angels, and prevailed not, neither was their
place found any more in heaven. And the great dragon was cast
out, that old serpent called the devil, and Satan, which deceiveth
the whole world. He was cast out unto the earth,
and His angels were cast out with Him. And I heard a loud
voice saying in heaven, Now is salvation, and strength, and
the kingdom of our God, the power of His Christ. For the accuser
of the brethren is cast down, which accused them before our
God day and night. And they overcame Him by the
blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony. They
loved not their lives unto the death. Therefore rejoice, ye
heavens, And ye that dwell in them, woe to the inhabiters of
the earth and of the sea. For the devil is come down unto
you, having great wrath, because he knows that he hath but a short
time. And when the dragon saw that he was cast into the earth,
he persecuted the woman which brought forth the man-child.
Until the woman was given two wings of a great eagle, that
she might fly into the wilderness and to her place. For she is
nourished for a time, and times, and hath a time. from the face
of the serpent. And the serpent cast out of his
mouth water as a flood after the woman, that he might cause
her to be carried away of the flood. And the earth helped the
woman, and the earth opened her mouth, and swallowed up the flood
which the dragon cast out of his mouth. And the dragon was
wroth. He was enraged with the woman,
and went to make war with a remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments
of God, and have the testimony of Jesus. I want to finish this
chapter tonight with three things that we see here in our text.
The first one is, I want to say something about how the church,
even in the Old Testament, was viewed of God. We see that in
verse 1. There was a great wonder in heaven,
this woman clothed with the sun and the moon under her feet.
And then secondly, I want us to look just a little bit more
at Satan and his fallen angels. And I want to do that because
we're going into the 13th chapter and it begins to speak a lot
there about demon activity that's in this world. We see what's
going on and we think, boy, man is terrible, what he plots and
plans. But there's something behind
what man does. And that's these demons, that's
Satan himself. So I want us to look just a little
bit tonight in verse 12 concerning Satan. Then I want to conclude
with God's provision for His church. And I guess we could
entitle this tonight, be the last point, a place prepared
of God. And I think we'll probably see
the need for that when we get there in just a minute. But let's
begin. Let's begin with this. I thought
it was very interesting here in verse 1, how John saw in this
vision the church of the Old Testament, which was this woman
here, how he saw her. And it was from heaven's point
of view she was clothed with the sun, and can you imagine
how bright she appeared, how shining and how glorious this
church appeared, and she had the moon underneath her feet. In other words, she was bright
and shining and she was standing upon the darkness. The darkness
was under her feet. She had subdued it. She is a
glorious, glorious church. How different that is from the
way the Old Testament church often viewed herself. And isn't
that very telling? When we view ourselves as the
scripture views us in and of ourselves, it's not difficult
for us to say, boy, that's the truth. When the Bible tells us
that there's not a just person upon this earth and doeth good
and sinners not, we say, that's me. That's me. Christ came into
this world to save sinners. We say, that's me. And it's not
difficult for us to judge ourselves as the Bible judges us. But here's
something that's very difficult for us to do. Judge ourselves
as God sees us in Jesus Christ. That's difficult. That's difficult,
Ben, to grasp this standing that we have with God. The Old Testament
church sometimes was really down on itself. She often spoke of
herself like this, that she was barren, that she was desolate,
that she was forsaken, that she was vile. She called herself
a worm. She saw herself as the vilest
thing, even called her righteousness filthy rags. minstrel's claws. She looked at herself and she
judged herself to be the offscoring of all things in this world,
unworthy of the least of God's tender mercy. And she specially
was down on herself when the Lord put the rod of chastening
heavy to her back. Listen to what she said about
herself when she found herself chastened of the Heavenly Father.
Rebuke me not in your anger. And don't chasten me in your
hot displeasure, for your iris stick fast in me, and your hand
presses me sore. My wounds stink and are sore
corrupt because of my foolishness. My loins are filled with a loathsome
disease. I am troubled. I am bowed down
greatly. I go mourning all the day. I
am become a widow, she said of herself. I weep sore in the night,
and my tears are upon my cheeks. I have grievously sinned, and
my beauty is departed from me." Now, that's a pretty low opinion
of yourself, isn't it? But that's the way she saw herself. And you often see these complaints
that she had against herself. There were times in the Old Testament
where there were just a handful of the church left. And that's
one of the reasons she called herself desolate. Remember Noah's
day? How many people were saved in
Noah's day? How many was in the church in
Noah's day? Eight people, counting Noah.
Patrick, we don't have too much to complain about, really, do
we? He had eight people for 120 years and he never got a convert.
No wonder he said we're desolate. Elijah, in his days, he said,
mistakenly so, I am the only one left, and they seek my life
to destroy it. There was a time when the church
in the Old Testament lost the mercy seat. Remember that? They
lost the Ark of the Covenant to the Philistines and Lacta
never got it back. They went into captivity to the
Babylonians. They were in captivity to the
Assyrians. They were in captivity to the
Medes and Persians and Greeks and the Romans. You talk about
trials. You talk about tribulation. The
Old Testament had it. And yet, when John sees this
vision of the Old Testament church, he sees her clothed with the
sun. She's bright and shining and glorious and she's standing
upon the moon with all the darkness under her feet. The darkness
had passed and the true light now shined. She knew the way
of salvation. She knew the Lord, her righteousness. Jeremiah called Him that, didn't
he? The Lord, our righteousness. She loved Him and she knew Him. And I'm just saying, brothers
and sisters, The way God views His church in the New Testament
and the Old Testament is vastly different than the way we judge
and view ourselves. But listen, why did He have such
a high opinion of the church? Why did He speak of her as being
such a glorious church? Well, how precious must the Old
Testament saints be since God had chosen them? I mean, He didn't
choose everybody. He told Israel one day, he said,
I've chosen you. And the reason I've chose you
is not because of you. It wasn't because you're a greater
number than anybody else, but I chose you because I loved you. How much did he love her? How
precious was she in God's sight that God set His love upon her
and chose her to salvation. How clean must she be? Not in
her own eyes, but in God's eyes. If she's washed in the blood
of God's dear Son, I mean, she must be clean. When God looks
at her and says, I find no fault in you, I see no sin in her,
how clean she must be. How beautiful she must be in
God's sight since she was clothed in the perfect robe of the righteousness
of God's own Son. Bring the best robe and put on
her. The best robe heaven can give,
the garments of salvation. When God viewed her, he said
she's glorious in her apparel. The king's daughter is glorious
within. What was God looking at? He was
looking at the righteousness of his son and says, You're beautiful. You're comely. You're clothed
in my righteousness. How just and holy he must see
her to be when he's the very one who justified her. Who can
lay anything to the charge of God's elect? It's God who justifies,
and if God justifies you, nobody can bring any charge to your
cap. How accepted God must have estimated
her to be since He had accepted her in His beloved Son. And how much He must have loved
the church of old because she was born of God. She was born
of God. So here she was. She was clothed
in the sun. She had the moon under her feet.
The darkness had passed for her. She knew that the Lord was her
righteousness. The Lord was her salvation. She
knew the way of forgiveness. And the Lord spoke highly of
her. And if he spoke that highly of
the Old Testament church, don't you think he feels the same way
about the New Testament church? Listen to what he says about
the New Testament church. Christ loved the church, and
he gave himself for the church, that he might sanctify it, set
it apart to himself, and cleanse it with a washing of water by
the word, that he may present it to himself a glorious church. not having any spot or wrinkle
or any such thing, but that it should be holy and without blemish. Now, when you look at yourself,
you call yourself all kinds of names, don't you? Vile, wretched,
like mistress cloth. But I'm telling you when heaven
views you, it sees you altogether different. There's no salvation
in the church. We know that. But you can't be
saved if you're not in the church. Salvation's not through the church
or by the church, but you can't be saved if you're not in the
church. The church is the one that's glorious. And the only
way to get in the church is for Him to put you in the church.
He added to the church daily such as should be So that's wonderful
to see how the Lord viewed His Old Testament saints. Abraham
and Noah and all of the saints of old. Let's quickly say something
here about Satan and his angels. Here in verse 4, we go back there
again because this is the initial time, the first time the Scripture
talks about Satan drawing his demons with him, his angels with
him. and cast them down to the earth. And the scripture has
something to say about this. When the angels first sinned
and the Lord said, I beheld Satan as lightning fall from heaven
and the angels, I wonder if he deceived those angels. He is
the chief deceiver. We're told down in verse nine
that he deceives the whole world. But listen to a couple of places,
Peter and Jude, they told about these angels and the fall of
these angels and listen to how dreadful it is. 2 Peter 2.4,
God spared not the angels that sinned. He didn't spare them. He didn't say, I know what you've
done, but I'm going to be merciful to you. I know what you've done,
but I've devised a way of redemption and forgiveness for you." He
didn't say that to those angels. He did not spur the angels. He
spurred you and me, hasn't He? But not them. He provided redemption
for us, but not them. He spurred not the angels that
sinned, but cast them down to hell. This word cast means to
sling as out of a slingshot. to drive out or throw down with
force or violence. He just didn't turn them out
of heaven. He got them in His huge sovereign hand and He cast
them out of heaven. Cast them down into hell. This word cast them down to hell
that Peter tells us, it's the Greek word Tartarus and it means
the deepest abyss. He cast them down to the deepest
hell. And Peter continues and said
this, He delivered them unto chains of darkness. They're bound with chains of
darkness. They're bound in their guilt. They're bound under the
awful wrath of God. They have no light. They dwell. They're captives to utter darkness. They're in the deepest despair.
There's not the least glimmer of joy or peace or comfort to
those demons who fail. And here's Peter adds something
to that lastly that has to increase their torment. He not only cast
them down to hell, he reserved them until the day of judgment
to be punished. Reserved them. That word reserved
means to keep the eye up on, to guard against one's escaping. And God keeps His eye on them.
They can't do anything except He gives them permission to do
it. Their activity is limited. They cannot escape their just
end. And what is that? To be punished.
To be punished. Now, here's a mystery. They're
permitted on occasions, and we don't know if all of them are
just part of them. But we know that several of them,
and maybe all of them, are permitted to get out of that bottomless
pit, the abyss, and to come out and do great havoc and harm to
this earth, to humanity. I don't know what determines
which one of them. I don't know how many of them. But I remember when the Lord
Jesus was casting the demons out of that Gadarene, remember,
they pleaded with Him, don't cast us into the abyss. They'd been permitted to get
out, and now they were afraid the Lord Jesus was going to cast
them back out into the pit. That's the place of punishment,
even for demons that's there. But on the last day, that great
day, these demons will be cast into the lake of fire and they'll
be punished forever and ever. Now I want you to look at that
over in the 20th chapter of Revelation and look in verse 10. The Scripture
says that the devils believe in God and they tremble. They
know God's a just God. He's a holy God and a powerful
God. And they know there's coming
a day when he is going to sentence them to a lake of fire. And he
is speaking here personally of the devil, but what is said of
the devil is said of all of them. Look in chapter 20 and verse
10. And the devil that deceived them,
the whole world except the elect, was cast into the lake of fire
and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are, and
shall be tormented day and night forever and forever. That is his end. That is His
end. But here is the sad and fearful
thing concerning humanity. Every unconverted person, every
individual out of Christ will be cast into the same lake of
fire where Satan is. Look in chapter 20 and look in
verse 15. And whosoever was not found written
in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire. The unconverted will suffer the
same eternal fate and punishment that Satan and his fallen angels
suffer. Depart from me, ye cursed, into
everlasting fire. Prepare for the devil and his
angels. Now that's fearful, isn't it? If unconverted people had just
a glimmer of what awaited them, dying in their sins, I tell you,
they wouldn't sleep as well as they do. They would not sleep
as well as they do. In Revelation chapter 12 again
in verse 13, John said, Woe to the inhabitants of the earth
and of the sea, for the devil is come down unto you having
great wrath, because he knows that he has but a short time. And so what does he do? He is
working overtime as a means to the damnation of everybody that
he can influence. But you know something? He especially
hates the church. We are told here in Revelation
chapter 12 and verse 13, when he saw that he was cast out into
the earth, he persecuted the woman. He persecuted the church. And this is the New Testament
church. In verse 17 it said the dragon
was wrought. He was enraged. He was extremely
angry with the church. burned in his wrath and persecuted
her. And verse 17, we're told here
who and why he hates the church. In verse 17, look at that. And
the dragon was enraged with a woman and went to make war with a remnant
of her seed, which keep the commandments of God and have the testimony
of Jesus Christ. What is the commandments of God?
I think of two right off the bat. This is His commandment,
that we believe in His Son, Jesus Christ, whom He has sent. Boy,
we could call that a great commandment, couldn't we? There's no salvation
apart from obeying that commandment. And the second one is sort of
lacking to it. Love one another. And when Satan
sees somebody open their Bible, to see what I'm going to believe
and how I'm going to live my daily life in this world. That
enrages Him. Are you on a battle on your hands?
You start reading the Lord's Word and believe and obey His
voice. Boy, that's what enrages the
devil. That enrages the devil. Those who keep the commandments
of God. And notice this. Secondly, those
who have the testimony of Jesus. This word testimony, it means
to bear witness to the record. I never noticed that before until
I looked up this word here in this particular place. It means
to bear witness to the record. God has given us a record of
His Son, hasn't He? He's given us a written record
of His Son and we read the record And then we go out and bear witness
to the record. And what is the record? Jesus
Christ, the Son of God. The Lord Jesus told the Jews,
search the Scriptures, search the written Word, for these are
they who testify of Me. This Bible is God's record. In
the volume of the book, it is written of Me. And you and I
just bear witness to the record. That's all we do. Paul said,
when I come to you, I came not with excellency of speech, declaring
unto you the testimony of God. I didn't came speaking eloquently. You may impress people with eloquence,
but you don't impress Satan. He's not impressed with that
at all. Paul didn't say, I come to you preaching my personal
convictions. I come giving to you my opinions. The devil don't
care for our personal convictions. That don't enrage him. But Paul
said, when I come to you, I came not like that. For I determined
nothing to know nothing among you, save Jesus Christ and Him
crucified. That's God's record, isn't it?
That's God's testimony of His Son. And when you and I just
open the Bible, and declare what God has said about His Son. That's
what enrages Satan. That's what makes him mad. He
said in verse 15, as the church began to do this, the serpent
spewed out of his mouth rivers as a flood to carry her away. And this is what's been going
on all the days of the New Testament church, as well as the Old Testament
church. Floods of persecution. The devil's behind when a government
turns on the church and persecutes the church and limits her worship.
The devil's behind that. It's a flood, and it's happened
all through the New Testament. We're 2,000 years now beyond
the cross, and we can look back, Gary, these 2,000 years, and
look at the places where Satan has stirred up governments to
kill Christians. He sends out this flood to try
to wash the church away. And heresies, the floods of heresies. These are two things. I mean,
Cindy just started reading the book of Acts. These are two things
the New Testament church had to contend with. Persecution.
It comes from false religion. It came from governments. And
sometimes it just seemed like it was going to wash them away.
It was so great a flood. And you know something? If God doesn't uphold the church,
this flood at times is so great that it would literally wash
the church away. Persecutions, false doctrines,
heresies. John said in his day, even now,
there's many antichrists. One of the first things they
started doing in the New Testament was attacking the person and
work of Christ. They begin by denying that Christ
had even come in the flesh. They begin by denying His physical
resurrection. Some of them were saying the
resurrection had passed already and overthrew the faith of some.
So He cast this flood out of His mouth, the flood of persecutions
and heresies. to try to wash her away. And
we're still continuing with this, aren't we? You take poor people
like us, none of us here, Patrick's probably the most educated person
in here. None of us have much sense, do we? Patrick's laughing
at me now. When I sit and talk with him,
he seems to me like he's a very educated person. But isn't it amazing that you
look at people like us And God has given us grace not to be
washed away by the flood of persecutions and the floods of heresy. I've
told you that I've been doing some research on this health
and wealth gospel and some of those things. I am absolutely
amazed at the false religion of our day. It's flooded our
country. And it's growing by leaps and
bounds. And the church is trying to stand
against this flood as she comes in. And I tell you, it's a miracle
as we do it. Charles Spurgeon said what amazed
him. He was looking at the churches
there in London and at the men that God had raised up and blessed
there. And thousands attended their
worship service. And Spurgeon said one day, he
said, he said, this is not the backbone of the church. So we got some, we got some big
churches here, he said, in London. Germany had some big churches.
But he said the backbone of the church is these country churches
that's scattered all over the world. And they're standing for
the truth. In spite of Satan tried to wash
him away with his flood. It's churches just like this,
brothers and sisters, in our day. In conclusion, thirdly, let's
look at God's provisions that he's made for his persecuted
church. Look in verse 6 and verse 14
quickly. And the woman fled into the wilderness,
where she had a place prepared of God, that they should feed
her there a thousand twelve hundred and sixty days." A place prepared
of God. And it said in verse 14, And
to the woman were given two wings of a great eagle, that she might
fly into the wilderness unto her place. where she is nourished
for a time, times, and half a time from the face of the dragon. God's provided a place for His
church. It's not a physical place. I
was reading one of the premillennial commentaries and they're trying
to figure out which desert God's going to send His church to when
the Antichrist takes over. They're already picking out places.
You can't hide from the government in our day. Forget about physical
places. This is not a physical wilderness. He uses the physical wilderness
because of what it represents. It's a barren place, isn't it?
A desolate place. There's no water there. There's
no gardens that grow there. You think of the wilderness,
you think of Israel spending 40 years there. Remember that?
They were in the wilderness. Listen to what the Bible says
about it. The Lord led us through the wilderness, through the land
of deserts, slime pits, through the land of drought, no water
there, no food there, and of the shadow of death, through
a land that no man passed through, where no man dwelt. What is this
world? It is a spiritual wilderness,
isn't it? There is no food for your soul
in this world. The world can't provide you with
the water of life, and it's a place where nobody's going to dwell
long. You stay here a few years, and we leave this place, don't
we? Because it's a wilderness. But God sustained them. He sustained the church in the
wilderness, and He gave them water out of the flint rock.
And He gave them manna from heaven. He gave them clothes that never
wore out on their back and shoes that never wore out and their
feet never swelled. So even though they were in the
wilderness for 40 years, He provided for them. Elijah was in the wilderness.
Remember that when he fled into the wilderness from Jezebel?
Did he starve to death there? God sent ravens and fed him.
The Lord provides for His people. Our Lord Jesus Himself spent
40 days in the wilderness tempted of the devil, and the Father
sent angels to minister to Him and to provide for Him. And in
verse 16 of our text, it said that the earth helped the woman
and swallowed up the floods that were sent out of this old serpent's
mouth. The earth helped her. You know
God's got every means available to Him. He can use means to support
His people, or He can do it directly. He can use the earth. He can
use people. He can use all the means that
He's pleased to use. When those dear saints in Hebrews
chapter 11 had their property confiscated, they had their clothes
stolen from them, their house was taken from them, God provided
dens and caves of the earth for shelter. And He gave them goat
skins and sheep skins to keep them warm. You say, Bruce, that's
not much, but that's enough. He didn't say that He provided
a place where she would grow rich and lazy and at ease, but
He provided her a place and nourishment For all through the gospel age,
so she wouldn't be swept away by this flood. And we look back
2,000 years, and the church hasn't been swept away by this flood.
And it's because God has provided a place for the church. And you notice how it said there
in verse 14, her place. She went unto her place. Then the Lord Jesus said to the
church, I go to provide a place for you. I don't think he was
talking about mansions up in heaven. I think one place he's
talking about was the throne of grace. I go to provide you
a place, your throne of grace to go to when you need mercy
to help you in the time of need, there's a place you can go to.
And the church has been going there now for 2000 years, hasn't
she? And we still go there, don't we? When we're weak, when we
sin, when we need help, when we need grace, there's a throne
of grace and mercy that we can go to. That's our place. Boy,
the world has no lead of it. The world don't take advantage
of it, but the church sure does. But it's more than just a place
to go to. I tell you, the church is a place
where she's secure from all harm, eternal harm. And that's in Christ. Boy, that's the place that God
has provided for His church. It's in the Lord Jesus Christ. She's got food there, hasn't
she? She's provided nourishment. We can eat of His redeeming broken
body. We've got meat to eat the world
knows not of. We've got drink. We can drink
of that redeeming blood. This is my blood of the new covenant.
Drink ye all of it. In Christ, Satan may persecute
us in the flesh, but he cannot harm our souls because we are
hidden in Christ. Let governments pass all the
laws they want to. They cannot pass a law to condemn
the church. Because the church is in Christ
and there's no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus
the Lord. That's a good place, isn't it?
That's a good place. In Christ. Even in the wilderness. You ever feel like you're in
the wilderness? But sometimes, I'm telling you, God makes it
bloom, doesn't He? He just raises up a garden and
sends rain down, showers of blessings. right in the middle of our wilderness
journey. I love this, and we'll close
with this. Verse 14, look at this. And to the woman was given
two wings of a great eagle. Boy, the Bible's got a lot to
say about eagles and wings. Such a good lesson. But let me
just read a few of them to you. 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. You have seen what I did to the
Egyptians, saith the Lord, how I bore you on eagles' wings and
brought you to myself. As an eagle stirs up her nest,
fluttering over her young, spreading abroad her wings, taking them,
burning them on her wings. So the Lord alone did lead you,
and there was no strange God with you. Keep me as the apple
of your eye. Hide me under the shadow of thy
wing." Could you find a better hiding place? Under His wings? How excellent is thy lovingkindness,
O God, Therefore the children of men put their trust under
the shadow of thy wings. Be merciful unto me, O God, be
merciful unto me, for my soul thirsteth for thee, my soul trusteth
in thee. Yea, in the shadow of thy wings
will I make my refuge until these calamities be overpassed." God
has provided a place of shelter. and provision for his people.
Or is it under his wings? And listen to these two. I will
abide in thy tabernacle forever. I will trust in the shelter of
thy wings. Because thou hast been my help,
therefore in the shadow of thy wings will I rejoice, I reckon. He shall cover thee with his
feathers, and under his wings shall thou trust. His truth shall
be thy shield and thy buckler. I'd say, brothers and sisters,
it doesn't matter how large a flood and how swift they be that Satan
sends out. I would say the church is pretty
safe. I would say it's pretty safe and sound, wouldn't you? We read these places like this
in the book of Revelation, and there's some Scary things that
we read. But it seems like it always adds
something like this to give peace and quietness to our soul. That
the Lord cares and protects His people. Let's sing 269. One to come and listen. 269.
And stand with me while we sing this. Under His wings. 269.