Dear John & the Doves,
Please accept my study on the timing of the Rapture from the viewpoint of Revelation 12 to your letters.
Even though this chapter of the Book of Revelation is very symbolic, I think it actually might be the most straightforward description in the Bible of the events leading up to and surrounding our Blessed Hope.
Shalom and Maranatha Lord Jesus!
Yours in Christ,
E.L.
-------The Rapture According to Revelation 12
Context in Revelation
Revelation chapter 12 opens a new type of highly symbolic narrative phase compared to the previous chapter 11, which ends with a description of the effects of the seventh trumpet in Heaven and on earth. With this change, it is highly likely that Revelation 12 deviates chronologically from the previous chapter, and is not a direct continuation of it.
1. Wonders in Heaven
Revelation 12 begins with a description of a great sign in heaven, a Woman who has difficulty giving birth:
12:1 And there appeared a great wonder in heaven; a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars:
12:2 And she being with child cried, travailing in birth, and pained to be delivered.
Rev.
After this another sign appears in heaven, a great red dragon, which seeks to devour the woman’s child as soon as it is born:
12:3 And there appeared another wonder in heaven; and behold a great red dragon, having seven heads and ten horns, and seven crowns upon his heads.
12:4 And his tail drew the third part of the stars of heaven, and did cast them to the earth: and the dragon stood before the woman which was ready to be delivered, for to devour her child as soon as it was born.
Rev.
2. The Rapture of the Man Child
However, the Man Child which the woman brought forth was caught up from before the dragon unto God, and to his throne in Heaven: and the woman that is left upon the earth fled into the Wilderness unto the place prepared for her by God:
12:5 And she brought forth a man child, who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron: and her child was caught up unto God, and to his throne.
12:6 And the woman fled into the wilderness, where she hath a place prepared of God, that they should feed her there a thousand two hundred and threescore days.
Rev.
3. Identities of the Key Characters
3.1. The Woman
The Woman mentioned in verses 1-6 symbolizes the nation of Israel, through whom Salvation came into the world in the form of Jesus Christ (John 4:22). The Sun and Moon surrounding the woman and the twelve stars as a Crown are a reference to the Patriarch Jacob or Israel in the Book of Genesis, and his twelve sons, of whom the most beloved son Joseph sees a dream of the sun, moon, and eleven stars, or his father, mother, and brothers, bowing down to him (Genesis 37:9). The twelve tribes of Israel are said in the Bible to descend directly from Jacob (Genesis 49:28).
3.2. The Man Child
The Man Child born of the Woman is Jesus Christ Himself, who will rule all the Gentile nations with an "iron scepter" and His Body, or all true believers, who will also rule the Gentiles with an iron scepter together with Him (Rev. 2:26-27).
The Woman's birth pangs describe the increasing tribulation of people on earth in the midst of wars and persecutions and the distress of the entire Creation amidst increasing natural disasters, which culminate in the Rapture of the Man Child and in the beginning of the Day of the LORD (Matt. 24:8, Rom. 8:22, 1 Thess. 5:3).
3.3. The Dragon
The dragon can be directly identified as the devil according to verse 9 (Rev. 12:9), who tries to swallow up or destroy the true believers in Jesus who are to be Raptured as a part of the Man Child. The stars thrown to the earth by the dragon may be a partial description of the shaking of the powers of heaven just before the Day of the LORD (Rev. 6:13, Matt. 24:29), when the Sun and Moon will also be darkened as a sign of its beginning (Rev. 6:12, Joel 2:31).
The darkening of the Sun and the Moon may also mean that at this point the latest the twelve tribes of Israel will have to bow down to their own brother, the Man Child of Israel, whom they had previously rejected, just as the brothers of Jacob, the son of Israel, did not bow down to their Father's favorite son (Gen. 37:9-19). Joseph can be seen as one of the types of Jesus in the Old Testament.
4. War in Heaven
Next, war breaks out in heaven between the Archangel Michael and his angels and the dragon and his angels, who are cast down to the earth:
12:7 And there was war in heaven: Michael and his angels fought against the dragon; and the dragon fought and his angels,
12:8 And prevailed not; neither was their place found any more in heaven.
12:9 And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.
Rev.
The appearance of Archangel Michael in heaven tells the exact timing of the Rapture of the Man Child in relation to the other prophecies of the End Times in the Bible. The prophet Daniel tells in the 12th chapter of his book that Michael will come to protect Daniel's people, the Israelites, when a time of trouble never seen before breaks out on earth, which is the Great Tribulation prophesied by Jesus on the Mount of Olives (Matt. 24:21):
Dan. 12:1 And at that time shall Michael stand up, the great prince which standeth for the children of thy people: and there shall be a time of trouble, such as never was since there was a nation even to that same time: and at that time thy people shall be delivered, every one that shall be found written in the book.
The name Michael can also be a reference to Jesus as God, for Michael translated from Hebrew means "Who is like God?" i.e. Michael fighting in heaven can also be a description of Jesus Rapturing the true believers from the earth (1 Thess. 4:16).
5. A Loud Voice in Heaven
After that, a loud voice is heard in Heaven praising God and His Anointed One, or Jesus Christ, who conquered death, and rejoicing in the casting out of the devil and in the victory of believers over him through the protection of the Blood of the Lamb and the Word of their Testimony:
12:10 And I heard a loud voice saying in heaven, Now is come salvation, and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of his Christ: for the accuser of our brethren is cast down, which accused them before our God day and night.
12:11 And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony; and they loved not their lives unto the death.
12:12 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 knoweth that he hath but a short time.
Rev.
This loud voice of praise is a reference to at least one, if not all of the many cries of praise in the Book of Revelation that are heard at the rightful judgments of God and the Lamb. A similar cry is said to occur both after God's judgment of Babylon the Great, just before the Second Coming of Jesus (Rev. 19:1) and when a great multitude coming out of the Great Tribulation appears in Heaven before the Throne of God and the Lamb, who have also washed their robes clean by the Blood of the Lamb:
7:10 And cried with a loud voice, saying, Salvation to our God which sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb.
...
7:12 Saying, Amen: Blessing, and glory, and wisdom, and thanksgiving, and honour, and power, and might, be unto our God for ever and ever. Amen.
...
7:14 And I said unto him, Sir, thou knowest. And he said to me, These are they which came out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.
Rev.
This cry of praise is also a reference to the power which Jesus was given through His work on the Cross (Matt. 28:18) and His victory over death and the casting out devil, or satan (John 12:31), and to the culmination of this Victory, the Rapture of all true believers, both living and dead in Christ, according to and through the Resurrection of their Lord Jesus Christ (1 Cor. 15:54).
6. The Dragon Persecutes the Woman
Noticing that he has been cast down to the earth, the dragon persecutes the Woman, or the nation of Israel, who gave birth to the Man Child. But God protects Israel in the Wilderness from the face of the serpent for a thousand two hundred and sixty days (Rev. 12:6) or a time, and times, and half a time, or three and a half years:
12:13 And when the dragon saw that he was cast unto the earth, he persecuted the woman which brought forth the man child.
12:14 And to the woman were given two wings of a great eagle, that she might fly into the wilderness, into her place, where she is nourished for a time, and times, and half a time, from the face of the serpent.
Rev.
This period of three and a half years is also a reference to the book of Daniel, where prophet Daniel says that the "end of these wonders" is yet "a time, times, and half a time," away or three and a half years (Dan. 12:7). This period begins with the Great Tribulation (Rev. 12:1) and ends with the sounding of the Seventh Trumpet in the Book of Revelation, when this time is said to have passed, and there shall be time no longer (Rev. 10:5-7).
7. The Reign of beasts on Earth
As the dragon becomes angry realizing that his attempts to destroy the Woman are futile, he then goes to make war against the remnant of Her seed, or the descendants of Israel, people who have been left out of the Rapture, who now have awakened to testify of Jesus and keep the commandments of God:
Rev. 12:17 And the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ.
This begins the reign of the beasts of the Book of Revelation on earth, which will culminate in the judgment of the earth and the Second Coming of Jesus with all his Saints.