Revelation 12:13 Commentary and Bible Study

From verse 13 to the end of the chapter is an elaboration of verse 6. The woman who gave birth to the child and her child was snatched up to heaven, but she herself remained on earth. She represents the church militant. God has not yet removed her from the earth, but her welfare is still of the utmost importance to him. Satan’s hostility is directed against the church on earth, because the church in heaven the church triumphant, is beyond his reach. Hurting the church on earth is as close as he can get to hurting the Lord. Those saints who are now in heaven: he once counted as his own, certain to perish miserably in hell, but they have escaped his grasp. He didn’t believe it was possible, but Christ has accomplished it. In his anger he flails around in an attempt to do any harm he can to the cause of God. He persecutes the woman who gave birth to Christ. She gave birth to the Messiah, that child who would be her deliverer: the seed of the woman who would break the head of the serpent. Now she continues to live on earth waiting for the final day when he will return for her.How does the dragon persecute the woman? He uses every possible deceitful and cruel strategy: exclusion, betrayal, threatenings, deprivation, poverty, beating, isolation, misrepresentation, false teaching, lies, torture, murder, and mass extermination. Yet nothing has succeeded in extinguishing faith in God’s people.