By Jordan Friesen, Lead Pastor
Vine Community Church, El Dorado,
Butler-Times-Gazette Bulletin

This past year on Christmas Sunday I preached an unusual passage for Christmas time: Revelation 12:1-6. Here’s a portion of what this text says:

“And a great sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars. She was pregnant and was crying out in birth pains and the agony of giving birth. And another sign appeared in heaven: behold, a great red dragon, with seven heads and ten horns, and on his heads seven diadems. His tail swept down a third of the stars of heaven and cast them to the earth. And the dragon stood before the woman who was about to give birth, so that when she bore her child he might devour it.” (Holy Bible, v. 1-4).

The woman in this passage is true Israel. The dragon is Satan. The stars that he cast down from heaven are his demons. You will notice in this passage that the dragon is hovering over the woman wanting to devour her son. The Son is of course, Jesus.

What this passage teaches us is that from the very moment God promised Satan in Genesis 3:15 that from the line of woman would come one who would crush his head, Satan has always tried to stop this promise from coming to fruition. He has tried to stop the Messiah from being born. He did this through Pharoah who tried to wipe out all the baby Hebrew boys in Egypt. He did it through Haman when he tried to have all the Jews killed. And of course, he did it through Herod, who attempted to kill all the baby boys two years and under born in Bethlehem so as to stop the Messiah from overtaking his throne.

But ultimately v. 5 tells us the dragon failed and the son was caught up to heaven and seated at God’s right hand. This happened in Christ’s death, resurrection, and ascension.

So, what does this have to do with Christians? John wrote this to encourage the church, to remind her, that no matter what Satan may throw at us, Jesus’ promise will come to pass, the gates of hell will never prevail against Christ’s church. Even though there may be times it seems like the dragon is prevailing, just as he tried to stop the Messiah from coming into the world and failed, so too he will try and stop the Gospel from advancing through the church, but he will fail.

The nations will be discipled, the world will one day confess Christ is Lord, and Christ will reign over this entire planet as the king of kings and Lord of Lords.

If you are not a Christian, and you are reading this, Jesus wants you to confess him as Lord today. Confess your sin to him, believe in your heart that he died for your sin and rose the third day and you will be saved.