Days of Vengeance - The Preterist Archive

12:12
And when we see the Lord warring against the devil,
we also see Him being given angelic assistance (cf.
Matt. 4:11; 26:53; Luke 22:43). As Michael leading the
angels, Christ led His apostles against the Dragon,
driving him out of his position. The message of the
Gospels is that in the earthly ministry of Christ and His
disciples, Satan lost his place of power and fell down to
the earth:
And the seventy returned with joy, saying, “Lord, even
the demons are subject to us in Your name.” And He said to
them, “I was watching Satan fall from heaven like lightning.
Behold, I have given you authority to tread upon serpents and
scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy, and nothing
shall injure you. Nevertheless, do not rejoice in this, that the
spirits are subject to you, but rejoice that your names are
recorded in heaven.” (Luke 10:17-20)
What Revelation 12 portrays is just that: not only the
subjection of the demons to the saints, but the
recording of the saints’ names in heaven – their
sentence of justification, of right standing in heaven’s
hall of justice, for their accuser has been thrown out of
court, his false testimony invalidated. The word for
conquer in this verse (nikao – ) carries the connotation,
not only of a military victory, but of a legal victory as
well; the winning of a favorable verdict (cf. Rom. 3:4).
The definitive accomplishment of this, of course, was
Christ’s atonement for the sins of His people; thus, just
before He offered up Himself as the sacrifice, our Lord
said: “Now judgment is upon this world; now the ruler
of this world shall be thrown out” (John 12:31). In
Christ’s victory, salvation and the Kingdom came to
earth. Satan was defeated.
The very language of the Gospels bears this out. The
standard term for Christ’s “casting out” of the demons
throughout His ministry (ekballo – ; cf. Matt. 8:16, 31;
9:33-34; 10:1, 8; 12:24, 26-28) is simply an intensive
form of the word used repeatedly in Revelation 12 for
the “throwing down” of the Dragon (ballo – ). And Jesus
announced: “If I cast out demons by the Spirit of God,
then the Kingdom of God has come upon you” (Matt.
12:28). The message of Revelation is consistent with
that of the New Testament as a whole: Christ has
arrived, Satan has been thrown down, and the
Kingdom has come. By His death and resurrection,
Christ “disarmed” the demons, triumphing over them
(Col. 2:15). Satan has been rendered powerless (Heb.
2:14-15), and so St. Paul was able to assure the
believers in Rome that “the God of peace will soon
crush Satan under your feet” (Rom. 16:20). The Cross
was the mark, Jesus said, of the judgment of the world
(John 12:31) – or, as John Calvin rendered it, the
reformation and restoration of the world. 37 The
illegitimate ruler of the world was cast out by the
coming of Christ. As He announced at His Ascension,
“All authority (exousia) in heaven and on earth has
been given to Me” (Matt. 28:18). St. John’s vision
declares the same thing: The Kingdom of our God and
the authority (exousia) of His Christ have come!
12 The Voice from heaven exhorts the congregation to
exultant worship: For this reason, rejoice, O heavens,
and you who tabernacle in them. Who are these who
tabernacle (not just dwell) in heaven? St. John has made
it plain by this time that the Church’s worship takes
place, really and truly, before the heavenly throne of
God (4:4-11; 5:8-14; 7:9-17). The New Testament
clearly reflects this understanding on the part of the
apostles and the early Church, declaring that God has
raised us up with Christ to the heavenly places (Eph.
2:6), where we have our citizenship (Phil. 3:20). Our
worship is beheld by the angelic multitude (1 Cor.
11:10; Eph. 3:10), for we have come to the heavenly
Jerusalem, where innumerable angels are gathered in
festal assembly with the Church (Heb. 12:22-23).
Those who are called to joyful praise for the coming of
the Kingdom and the defeat of the Dragon, therefore,
are the Church. We have followed the Child in His
victorious Ascension (Eph. 1:20-22; 2:6), and have
become His Tabernacle (cf. 7:15; 13:6).
But Christ’s definitive conquest of the Dragon does not
mean the end of his activity altogether. Indeed, like a
cornered rat he becomes even more frantically vicious,
his snarling rage increasing with his frustration and
impotence. The Voice from heaven thus declares: Woe
to the Land and the Sea, because the Dragon has
come down to you, having great wrath, knowing that
he has only a short time. The Seventh Trumpet has
sounded (11:15), and the Third Woe has arrived (see
8:13; 11:14). The domain of the Dragon, following his
defeat at the Ascension of Christ, has now become the
Land and the Sea; he has lost forever the Edenic
sanctuary, which had been surrendered to him by
Adam. Thus, in Chapter 13, St. John sees two great
Beasts in the Dragon’s image, arising from the Sea and
the Land. The Sea, in St. John’s imagery, will turn out
to be the heathen nations (see below, on 13:1-2),
raging and foaming in their hatred against the Lord and
His Christ (cf. Ps. 2:1). And, as we have seen
repeatedly, Israel is represented by the Land. The Voice
is warning that both Israel and the Empire will become
demonized in Satan’s mad frenzy to hold onto the
decayed, withering remnants of his illicit rule. The
Dragon has only a brief period left in which to bring
about the ruin of the Church, while she is still
connected to old Israel; he will seek to stir up Land and
Sea, first in a demonic partnership against the Church,
and then in a war against each other, in order to crush
the Church between them. Like a deposed gangster on
the run, the Dragon tries to consolidate his power for a
last, desperate stand. But he knows he is doomed; time
has almost run out.
The Dragon Attacks the Church (12:13-17)
13 And when the Dragon saw that he was thrown down to
the Land, he persecuted the Woman who gave birth to
the male Child.
14 And two wings of the great Eagle were given to the
37. John Calvin, Commentary on the Gospel According to John (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1979), Vol. 2, p. 36; cf. Ronald S. Wallace, Calvin’s Doctrine of the
Christian Life (Tyler, TX: Geneva Ministries, [1959] 1982), p. 110.
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