Revelation 12

Signs. A pregnant woman and a fiery red dragon. What do they tell us about God's authority and our role?

Signs point people to God. They demonstrate divine authority. They show and make known divine power.

An AI Generation by Substack based on my description of “a fiery red dragon with seven heads and ten horns and coronets on each head” Not quite there but close! My first AI attempt. I admit, I’m in two minds of AI — its power consumption and scraping of everyone’s content including mine for free without even asking! yet being able to do things like this — but I got a little impatient at being unable to find an image even somewhat close (a single-headed dragon just won’t cut it) and I’m not capable of drawing it. The three other choices all had five heads. So much for AI being able to count!

While reading Revelation, I’m reminded that time is immaterial. Chronology is absent. The pregnant woman who appears in heaven and births Jesus had already happened at the time of John’s vision. The fiery red dragon is another symbol for the serpent in the garden of Eden that tempted Eve and defeated a passive Adam.

Then Jesus defeated Satan and rescued Eve and Adam.

Note: I’m following N.T. Wright’s Revelation: 22 Studies for Individuals and Groups and his newest book 20th Anniversary Edition with Study Guide, Revelation for Everyone. See my post Prepare for Revelation for suggested materials.

An Animation Review of Chapter 1 to 11

I found this animation a helpful summary. I agree with most of its interpretation.

The Signs’ Certainty

Chapter 12’s two signs remind us of what has already happened yet is also happening now and into the future. These signs show only two certain things:

“She gave birth to a male child, who is going to rule all the nations with a rod of iron. The child was snatched away to God and to his throne.” Rev 12:5

• Jesus will rule all the nations.

• Jesus is safe with God by the throne.

Are the Two Signs Symbols?

The fiery red dragon has all the marks of Satan. The traditional colour, animal type, hellfire symbol. N.T. Wright suggests that the pregnant woman symbolizes Israel or Eve. But is a sign a symbol?

Perhaps in taking this image apart, we lose sight of the signs’ bigger picture.

If a sign points us to God, God’s divine power, and demonstrates divine authority, then the entire image — the two signs being two halves of a whole — does that. We see Jesus being birthed, Satan waiting to devour the newborn, and God snatching away the male child. In other words, the signs show us the conflict in heaven and God having more power and authority than Satan does. We also see that the pregnancy emerged from heaven — not earth.

God is like the lead character in The King’s Avatar: calm in every battle from having the certainty of superior knowledge, skill, authority, tactics, anticipated failures to leap to the goal, and power in the online game Glory. Calm from having anticipated all, having plans with many tracks that lead ultimately to the same goal: winning.

God Partners with Angels and Humans; Satan Does Not

The image continues to unfold in the second half of chapter 12. Thwarted, Satan wars with the angels in heaven.

But again this image points us to God’s power and authority. God has the power to throw Satan out of heaven but didn’t use it until after Jesus was born and snatched to the safety of God sitting in the throne room. In the Book of Job, Satan still existed in heaven. Satan approached God to accuse Job of worshipping God only because he had a comfy, wealthy life with lots of family.

But now Satan has lost the accusing role. God has enacted the next part of the plan. Which makes sense. With Jesus having conquered death and God’s plan is to save everyone, does God need an accuser in heaven anymore?

Satan and Demons War Despite Knowing They’ve Lost

The relationship between God and humans has shifted. But now humans must contend with one pissed-off Satan and and Satan’s angels (demons). Yet, in the Gospels, Jesus threw demons out of humans. So we’re back in God’s idea of past is present, future is past, and who the fuck knows where we are in time!

The signs in this image, though, point us to God’s power. God’s angels responded to Satan’s call for war and God threw Satan and demons down to earth, for “there was no longer any place for them in heaven.” Rev 12:8. It’s like God and the angels are so closely allied that they can work together without God needing to tell the angels what to do when Satan attacks. Unlike most humans.

At first, the fiery red dragon hared off in pursuit of the woman who’d given birth to Jesus, whom God hid in the desert. But God’s plan is to hide the woman temporarily. Unlike Jesus, the woman will not have permanent safety. And neither will her children. Doesn’t that just suck? But then if our role is to partner with God to gain the victory, I guess we can’t be barricaded behind fortress walls impervious to Satan’s attacks.

And so the fiery red dragon switches direction and pursues the woman’s children. Revelation tells us that the children are those “who keep God’s commands and the testimony of Jesus.” These are the same ones marked by the big angel; the same ones who wail underneath the altar for justice; the same ones who returned to stand in front of the throne, holding palm branches, and bellowing that salvation belongs to God and to the lamb.

The signs point to Satan’s evolving role in God’s plan.

Satan has a plan as well. “And he stood on the sand beside the sea.” Chapter 13 tells us why.

But first, contrast how God works versus Satan. From page 82:

“The song of victory which follows this great event gives credit for the victory, not to Michael, but to God’s people on earth. ‘They conquered him,’ says the loud voice from heaven, ‘by the blood of the lamb and by the word of their testimony, because they did not love their lives unto death’ (verse 11). So who defeated the dragon? Was it Michael, or was it the martyrs?

“Well, in a sense it was both.”

• The angels battled in heaven, reflecting God’s authority.

• Early Christians partnered with God on earth.

The Christian peoples “learned to see [Satan’s traditional] supernatural ‘accusing’ activity standing not far behind all the ‘accusations’ that were levelled against them. Such accusations included both the informal ones, whispered by their critical neighbours [who wondered why they didn’t join them in their imperial religion]…and formal ones, brought by the authorities….All sorts of slanders and lies were told about the early church.”

Meanwhile, the demons didn’t back up Satan. Satan stood alone on the beach.

In traditional stories, Satan commands the demons. But so far, here, there’s no sense of that. They’re in one mind, having the same antipathy to God, but Satan doesn’t seem to have authority over “his” angels.

Novel Thoughts

Since in the days of my novel, God has already thrown Satan down to earth, along with the demons, like with characters in many novels and shows and movies, my protagonist will encounter demons when she returns to earth to finish her soul track. According to the Gospels, demons can inhabit humans. According to C.S. Lewis’s fabulous allegory, The Screwtape Letters, demons can whisper, cajole, and persuade humans to follow the ways of Satan. Will I have Charlotte Elisabeth struggle with both these kinds of assaults? After all, she has already survived the Earth-Heaven Interdimensional Expanse with its place beings of Dark, Desire, Wrath, and others. Would demons scare her?

But first, I’ll read chapter 13, for the signs aren’t done showing us God’s authority and power.