Angelic Battle Rev, 12:7-17

We have several things to cover before we get into the passage. One of the things that I encourage, of course, is questions, and here was a question that came up not too long ago. Will the Jews in the New Heaven and New Earth be rid of their old sin nature? Now, we'll be getting into this question in months ahead as we proceed through the book of Revelation, but just to try to answer that and address that briefly, the one thing is that the understanding of the old sin nature is something that uniquely comes out of the Apostle Paul's teaching, right? I mean, basically the Old Testament doesn't address it in quite explicit and thorough way as Paul brings forth, okay?

That's one thing that's, I think, important to bring out. What this passage that we'll be looking at in some months from now brings out, though, this is talking about the new heaven, the new earth. And these highlighted references here in verse 1, and then I kind of skipped down ahead to the end there. It talks about the new heavens and the new earth being in such a way that the old things have passed away.

The description of the new heavens and the new earth is such that it does not appear that there is any opportunity either by the nature of a person or by their will. for the old sin nature to be there or to express itself. There's nothing in the description that allows for that. So while we don't have some particular statement that says Jews will not have the old sin nature, the description that we have here seems to indicate that the kinds of behaviors that the old sin nature expresses are not going to be there in the new heaven and the new earth. It's one of the reasons for the Lord making a new heaven and a new earth. It's basically to say, I'm wiping the slate clean. Not even the old earth will do. Not even the old heaven will do. Which is almost surprising. We're not talking about just new stars. We're talking about a new heaven. So this is amazing stuff.

We'll get into this in more detail later. But the bottom line is, the indications we have, the old sin nature will have no part in the new heavens and the new earth. So we'll get into that further later. Okay, now let's go ahead and put ourselves into this passage here.

Revelation 12. And the first thing we'll want to do is to summarize what we looked at last week. We looked at Revelation 12, the first six verses. And as we did that, We saw a number of different things, but just to make sure we've got it clearly in our mind, because it's going to be important for us to have that in our mind before we step into this next passage.

The first thing is Revelation 12, 1-6 speaks of the woman, the dragon, and the child. Those three personalities there. The woman was clothed with the sun, with a moon at her feet, and twelve stars, and it crowned that woman as Israel. say that that comes out real clearly from Genesis 37, 9 and 10, so that confirms the identity quite well.

The great red dragon is Satan. He is a murderer from the beginning, which is the reason why he's described as being red, and he leads the angels of the Lord in a failed rebellion. It doesn't work, and we'll see more detail about that as we look here. Revelation 12 verse 9 and 20 verse 2 both confirm the identity of this great red dragon.

The child is Christ himself, who comes the first time as our suffering Savior, and the second time comes as the reigning Messiah, ruling with a rod of iron those upon the earth. So the woman was in travail, that's Israel, had been in travail to bring forth the child for the first time, the woman Israel would be the object of satanic pursuit, and we'll see more of that here as we look at it this morning, for the last half the tribulation period, three and a half years, but God would preserve the woman miraculously during that period of time, and we'll see that in more detail as we look at the rest of the passage this morning.

So that's kind of the the backdrop, the important pre-understanding that we have to have once we step into verse 7. Now, something else just to kind of get perspective here, because I think as we look at this we want to make sure we don't lose sight of what's starting to happen. John is introducing some things in chapter 12 that are going to start a pattern that we're going to see through the rest of the book of Revelation, at least through chapters 19 and 20. What do I mean?

The one thing is there are going to be seven signs. Remember he starts off chapter 12 saying there's a sign? There are seven signs in Revelation. Of those signs you have three of them at the top that I put in blue because it says they are signs in heaven. The next of those seven signs, four, I put in a brownish color meaning those are signs on earth. together between the 3 and the 4, you've got 7 signs that show up, as we'll note, from chapter 12 through chapter 19. So we're just looking at the first of those 7 signs here as we enter chapter 12.

There are a number of places in the book of Revelation where John explicitly uses the number 7. There are other places, and this is one of them, where he doesn't tell you, this is the first of 7, but when you start counting, Lo and behold, there it is. There's seven signs. I think you have that in your handout as well.

Beyond that, interesting backdrop, John wrote seven signs in the Gospel of John. Same author? He also wrote seven signs in the Gospel of John. Each of those were signs from chapters 2 through 11, starting with the changing of water into wine and ending with the raising of Lazarus. seven signs, and those signs were signs of his messiahship. We see from these Old Testament passages, Psalms, Isaiah, that those passages make it clear these are signs that he was the messiah. Fulfillment. And interesting, here's the same author, John, putting seven signs again in the book of Revelation. Now, that's not all. Ready for more sevens? Let's try it again. Seven great personages in the Tribulation.

And again, John doesn't introduce it and say, okay, here's the first of seven, but when you count it through there, they show up, and here they start in chapter 12. These personages are the woman, the great red dragon, the male child, Michael, and his holy angels, the remnant of the woman, the beast out of the sea, and the beast out of the earth. And we'll address each of these as we look through these chapters in the weeks and months ahead here. So the seven great signs three from the heavens, four from the earth, and seven personages, all beginning here in chapter 12 and ending, as we go through these, ending all of them by chapter 19 and at least by 20.

Now, with that, enough of an introduction, let's go on to verse 7. Verse 7 says, And there was war in heaven, Michael and his angels waging war with the dragons. The dragon and his angels waged war and they were not strong enough, and there was no longer a place found for them in heaven.

It's interesting, the Lord has chosen to reveal the names of two faithful angels, Michael and Gabriel, and we see both those names mentioned in the book of Daniel, and here we see the name Michael brought up, Michael, it says in Jude 9, was in a dispute with Satan over the body of Moses. So interesting, this Michael disputing with Satan is not something that is original here, it's happened before. The last time we see Michael show up is right here, at least by name. This is the last reference to Michael in the Bible. It may seem strange for us, because we think of heaven, boy, here's this nice peaceful place, There's a war in heaven. How about that? It's something that may almost seem like a conflict to us. What sense does that make?

It is one reason why the Lord brings it to a point where He says, I want a new heaven and a new earth. This old heaven has been contaminated by this satanic battle, if you will. And He says, I'm going to wipe the slate clean. And here is going to be a new heaven.

But here you see described, and this is kind of amazing, startling if you will, war in heaven, a battle going on. Now we think of spiritual warfare, don't we? We think of spiritual battles taking place. But here it actually describes the personalities.

Here's Satan, those following him. Here's Michael and those who are faithful to the Lord, following under his leadership. The battle takes place. We know the ratios from what was given there in our first through sixth passage. A third of those angels follow after Satan. Two-thirds follow after Michael. They're obviously overpowered, even by numbers, aside from the Lord's own authority. Obviously overpowered, so they are cast out. Now, here's something else. Satan and his angels are in heaven. How about that? This is a strange thing. But what we see finally coming to pass here is their access to heaven is cut off.

Ever think back about how in the early chapters of Job, you start reading about it, and what does Satan do? He goes and makes a request of God. He says, you know, Job's only this way because you put a hedge around him. I want, and here's Satan making requests. Satan, apparently, up until this point in time, is able to make access to God, make requests.

What appears to be happening in this passage is that access is finally cut off. And that is the reason why we find Satan so enraged, as we'll see further described in this passage. We'll see him enraged because for all the time up till then, he's had access to heaven, access to make requests of God, now it is cut off completely. and he is having fits. He's battling over this issue and he loses.

So what's going to happen is Satan, now being focused on earth, has a very limited range of things where he can direct his anger. And who does it get directed against? It gets directed against the Jews. It gets directed against those who have placed their faith in Christ. That's where he's going to focus it. And that's the root of anti-Semitism.

Even now, have you noticed, in our culture where there is no persecution, you can be opposed to any religion you want, as long as it's Christianity. Have you noticed that? It's already happening in our very calm, supposedly Christian culture, where Christians are the one religion that you can be prejudiced against.

Let's look at verse 9. And a great dragon was thrown down, the serpent of old, who was called the devil and Satan, who deceived the whole world. He was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him. Now this verse we just read here in Revelation 20, verse 2, leaves no doubt about the identity of the dragon, who is also called the serpent. That relates to Genesis 3, of course. He's the devil, Satan, and the deceiver, in case you had no doubt. Now, John makes a play on words which isn't readily apparent in the English, so I want you to take a look at it.

The Greek word for devil is diabolos. It's dia plus balo, and balo is, remember, that's the Greek word where we get our word ball, right? So here, dia plus balo means to always throw. is always casting accusations against us. Always. It's his character. Satan is constantly casting accusations at God about believers. At this point in time we're reading about it, God is telling Satan, Satan, this is enough. I'm drawing a line. You're out of here. That's what's happening.

But look at Revelation 2.10 that we've already covered some months ago.

The church-age believers were told that the devil, always thrower would throw, bolo, some of them into prison. You see that play on words that he's used there? Here in this passage, Revelation 12, 4, 9, 10, 13, we're told six times that the devil, that's this always thrower, was thrown to the earth. So here's the one who's always throwing, guess what happens to him? He gets thrown. He gets cast to the earth. So now we find that the one who has always been throwing accusations at believers, even then throwing them into prison, is now being thrown himself.

Here's the one who is constantly throwing accusations at God about you. That's right. You are the subject of discussion in heaven between Satan and God. God is constantly hearing accusations from Satan about you. And what does God say? God says, what do you mean?

I see Vern, and when I look at Vern, I see Jesus Christ. It's because we've been identified with Him all the way to the point of being seated with Him. We've been identified with Christ. Satan is constantly making accusations. What is he doing? He's constantly pointing to our condition. And when God comes back and He says, Satan, What I see is their position. Do you see that? The battle in heaven that is going on, that tug-of-war that is constantly taking place, is already won because of our position. That's what God throws back at Satan, and we can stand in it. Isn't that neat? We can stand in it. So we don't need to worry about this guy that's throwing. We stand in our position, and we don't let our condition control things. Our position is what controls things.

That's what God looks at. So what's happened here? We look ahead at verse 10. Let's get another insight here. Then I heard a loud voice in heaven saying, Now the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of His Christ has come. For the accuser of our brethren has been thrown down. He who accuses them before our God day and night. Here's another great opportunity for one of those loud voices.

Are you ready? I've been told that that wakes the kids up, so I better not do that. Okay. Because they've got the speaker in the nursery. Apparently it's real bad, so I won't do that. Okay. I'll have to tell you about it, and I'll have to leave it to Julia to keep Brian awake. Okay. Now, this verse rejoices in Christ taking power. Okay? This is a time of transition.

This verse also recognizes, again, Satan as the accuser. He is even now making accusations about you and me that don't stick. Now, let's take a look at verse 11. And they overcame him because of the blood of the Lamb and because of the word of their testimony, and they did not love their life even when faced with death. Now, let's look at what this verse is saying here.

Overcoming Satan comes about because of the blood of the Lamb. It's not because we fight hard. It's not because we say, boy, I'm going to be a real good Christian today. It's not because we make a bunch of promises, even if you make seven of them. It's because of the blood of the Lamb. That's how we overcome Satan. Notice also, we overcome Satan Because believers testify of the truth. It is the testimony of the truth that overcomes Satan. Because why?

His character is one of lies. He's a liar and deceiver. That's his character. How do we overcome that? The truth. We overcome Satan when we recognize that eternal life is far, far more important than maintaining the physical life. You see that? It is a sense of values It's what's important. Really think about it. That ultimately is pivotal in life, isn't it? It's questions of what's important. What really matters. And that's what this verse focuses on.

These believers here during this tribulation period are going to recognize and realize it's better off to love the life of Christ than the life of this world. a good trade. It's a bargain. Okay? It's a bargain. I'd be better off, they're recognizing, I'm better off to love the life of Christ and to have what that is for me eternally than to love this life because it's just an incomparable trade-off. If you put them on the balance, the balance scale just goes completely out of kilter. There's no comparison.

Some years back, a missionary friend of mine by the name of Dick Hillis was over in China. This was during the Cultural Revolution. Some years later, Dick became head of Overseas Crusades. But at this point in time, it wasn't quite so nice. He was at a place where a red Chinese lieutenant wanted to get from him the list of all the believers and Christians that he knew. Why? Gather them all up, right? Dick would not tell him who these people were. He wouldn't give him the list. He wouldn't write anything down. He wouldn't say anything about who these people were.

So the lieutenant says, I've got the solution. Pulls out his pistol and puts it up to Dick's head. He says, don't you know, Dick, that I could blow your brains out? And Dick responded with something that just absolutely threw the lieutenant back. He says, that is all you can do. That's all you can do. And the lieutenant put his gun back in his holster because he recognized He was powerless over Dick. Dick had recognized and already come to a point of seeing what was valuable and what was not. So he was able to come to this lieutenant and here's the lieutenant just a hair's breadth away from blowing a bullet through his head and Dick says, that's all you can do. That's all you can do. Same point here. Dick did not love life even when faced with death. Let's look at verse 12 here. For this reason rejoice, O heavens, and you who dwell in them. Woe to the earth and the sea, because the devil has come down to you having great wrath, knowing that he has only a short time."

Now, the heavens can rejoice because Satan has no further access. He can no longer come before God and make requests. He can no longer come before God and make constant accusations about believers. He cannot do it any longer. So, heaven's rejoicing. Now, the other thing, of course, is Satan's access is cut off. It's ended now. He's stuck. What has taken place is from the very time that Satan decided to rebel, the Lord has just tightened the noose around him. It's gotten tighter and tighter and tighter.

And this is his last chance before the Lord is going to chain him up during the millennium for a thousand years. So let's look at verse 13. And when the dragon saw that he was thrown down to the earth, he persecuted the woman who gave birth to the male child. The dragon, that is Satan, is like a cornered beast. He sees the limitations of his time. He sees the limitations of his domain. He is so insane with desperation At this point in time, he is going to go after the woman.

We know that that woman is Israel. In Romans 9, the last part of verse 3 through verse 5, Paul writes this to the people of Israel. My brethren, my kinsmen, according to the flesh, who are Israelites, to whom belongs the adoption of sons, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the temple, and the service, and the promises, whose are the fathers, and from whom is the Christ, according to the flesh, who is over all. God bless forever. Amen.

In spite of this fact, many of the people of Israel have been and now are spiritually blind. Do you know any spiritually blind Jews? Nancy and I have some as friends. A great many of the Jews do not now recognize their Messiah. That's a known fact. But they are the people through whom God has chosen to reveal many blessings. including the ones that we enjoy. We have been blessed with every spiritual blessing. Through whom? Through this woman, Israel. Isn't that amazing? This one who now, in great part, refuses to see the marvelous things that God has chosen to work through them. Let's look at verse 14 here.

But the two wings of the great eagle were given to the woman so that she could fly into the wilderness to her place where she was nourished for a time, and times, and half a time from the presence of the serpent. Now, some new symbolic terms are shown here in this verse. Some of them relate back to what we've seen before, but some are kind of new. What's this two wings and eagle and things like that? Well, let's take a look at those.

We already know that the woman is Israel, so let's stand first on what we know. We know that Satan, who is referred to here as the serpent in this verse, is in hot, angry pursuit of Israel. The woman, Israel, we know, is going to go into the wilderness to escape. Now, to gain clarity of the meaning, let's take a look here.

Here's an overhead that kind of puts the two, verse 6 and verse 14, side by side. Look at what is similar in terms of the things we know, as well as the things that are just said in different terms. Do you see that? There are some things that are parallel. The woman. The woman. Okay? Talking about the wilderness and the wilderness. Talking about being nourished. Now, so those are some things that are parallel.

The thing to look at here This is really just kind of an elaboration of verse 6. Verse 14 is an elaboration of verse 6. It's expanding upon it. The two wings of the great eagle and flying into the wilderness are reference to the woman fleeing into the wilderness with swiftness, very quickly. We've already been told that God would nourish the woman in the wilderness in verse 6. That shows up again in verse 14. It's not just Israel's idea or a wild run that happens to lead them there. The provision and protection is precisely what God has in mind.

Now, how about John writing for us? Nice melody. How about John writing for us? A time and times and half a time. What's that about? What does that mean? Well, we have at least two powerful indicators here of what that means. It sounds kind of puzzling on its own, doesn't it? But we've got some things that really nail this down.

First thing, a very similar context, we're told in verse 6, that Israel, the woman, would be nourished in the wilderness for 1,260 days. That's by the Jewish count of 30 days in a month, henceforth about three and a half years. Daniel chapter 7 and 12, which we looked at a few months back, that was back in February, makes use of this very same phrase, time, times, and half a time. So we've brought it up before. We showed there that it means three and a half years. So let's take a look at how that looks here. We've seen in Daniel 7 and Daniel 12, time, times, and half a time there clearly means three and a half years.

It's also quoted here in Revelation 12.14.

Revelation 13.5, which we'll get to, describes that same thing as 42 months.

And then we see in Revelation 12.6, the previous verse that we've looked at here, 1260 days.

And then we have another clue to nail it down, and that is Daniel 9.27.

One week, that is a week of years, but in the middle of that time. So a week of years would be seven years. The middle of that time would leave three and a half years. So we have converging four different lines of evidence saying three and a half years is the time.

What John is trying to make clear is he's drawing on the Old Testament usage. As we mentioned here, 70% of the revelation is out of the Old Testament. He's drawing on Old Testament usage and he is actually using, ultimately here, four different means of zeroing in on this three and a half year period of time. So it's very clear what he's talking about. Let's take a look at verse 15, okay?

And the serpent poured water like a river out of his mouth and after the woman so that he might cause her to be swept away with the flood. Now, the serpent, and we've been told in Revelation 12, 9 and 20 verse 2 that the serpent is Satan, he does something in his hope to profoundly impact the woman. He wants to wipe this woman out. He's saying, I've got earthly opportunity here, to wipe out the woman, Israel, and I'm going to do it.

And so Scripture is using a figure of speech here that's been used before. As a matter of fact, we made reference to it before. But here in Revelation 12-15, we see in the Old Testament, armies were referred to figuratively as water overflowing or as a flood. And here are several passages in which that is true. Out of Daniel and out of Isaiah, It is a Hebrew figure of speech.

To have a flood is an overpowering army. And you think about it, if you've ever been through a flood, I know several years back they had a flood on New Year's Day in Carson City where Nancy and I were. And I called her up early in the morning and I said, get the boys up, you know, come over here to the west side. We're sandbagging. The whole west side of Carson City is turned into rivers.

And so the flood was overpowering, and that's the figure of speech here that's used. It just pours over, and the army trying to defend just gets overwhelmed. So that's what this figure of speech is. So this flood pouring out of his mouth, it sounds like, boy, that's a wild figure of speech.

It's just saying Satan will bring about an army coming after God's people, which is intended to overpower them, overwhelm them, just like a flood wave hitting them. and blowing them away. That's the intent. Satan wants to take the Jews out. All of them. You see, during the Holocaust, during World War II, he only succeeded in taking out a third. That wasn't enough. He wants 100%. He's looking for totality here. He wants to overpower them, flood them, and wipe them out. No percentages here. The whole thing.

Verse 16 says this, But the earth helped the woman, and the earth opened its mouth, and drank up the river which the dragon poured out of his mouth. Now, to get a sense of what it's talking about, if we look at this, we might be inclined to think, well, the earth is taking on a personality. Again, this is figurative language, but the intent here is to say, Satan's going to come on with his overpowering army. The earth as the Jews head off into the wilderness, the earth is going to instead drink up this army that tries to come after Israel.

Let's take a look at it. There are lots of areas out there in the wilderness, but one part of the wilderness out there has some real fascinating landscape. Excuse me here while I sort through some things. Okay. Here, for example, is some of the landscape out in the wilderness. Now you see this little narrow canyon? Now just think of what it's like to get a troop truck through there. Right?

Now think of a line of troop trucks getting through there. What happens when you take out the first one and the last one? What happens to the ones in the middle? They're dead, right? And guess what? All you have to do is have some people up top shooting down and You've lost the whole army.

Here's some other examples of that same kind of terrain here. Here's another instance of this deep, narrow canyons that are out in this wilderness there that is in the southern part of Israel and on into the eastern area near Jordan. Here's another one that some tourists are examining.

It's kind of pretty country, but not the sort of place you want to drive a bunch of troop trucks and tanks and armored vehicles and that sort of thing. dangerous place to try to attack. But that's not all. There is also provision out there because there are ancient civilizations that basically have an infrastructure that's sitting out there. Places to live. Places to stay in protection. Here's another instance. Because ancient civilizations were established out there, the place for them to run and the place that will offer them harbor, as well as defense against an attacking army, is already there.

What is lacking there is provision of food and water. So that's why this text, twice, says God provides the nourishment. See that? God provides the nourishment. God will provide their physical needs to survive in this place. There's even leftover Roman roads out there. Here's some more. And some more. What's abundantly clear is that the place for them to run is there.

There are places for them to hole up and be protected. the earth itself, by its very structure, will allow them marvelous defense. Even given that, though, it's clear that the Lord is going to be allowing them to survive out in the desert during this time, out in the wilderness. The place is there, the place is ready, but the only way that they're going to survive in this place, even with all the military protection and places to live and everything else out there, the only way they're going to survive is by the Lord's provision. It will become abundantly clear to them during this time that only by God's intervention are they surviving this attack. That will turn their hearts. Now, let's take a look at verse 17.

So the dragon was enraged with the woman and went off to make war with the rest of her children who keep the commandments of God and hold on to the testimony of Jesus." Now, John is making no attempt to keep us guessing about who the rest of the children are, so he describes them as, and see what he says, those who keep the commandments of God and hold to the testimony of Jesus.

He is referring here to those who believe. They're not part of the body of the Christ, body of Christ, the Church, since we, the Church, will be with Christ in the heavenlies physically at that point in time. They are tribulation period believers, those who will become believers during this seven-year period of time. And these tribulation period believers John describes in two ways. He says they keep the commandments of God and they hold the testimony of Jesus. Now, we have something intriguing here, because keeping the commandments of God occurs twice in the book of Revelation here, and again in Revelation 14-12. John applies this in each case to tribulation period believers, and that's all, as he writes this book.

Elsewhere in the New Testament, it only occurs one other time, and that's when Paul writes, using that phrase, commandments of God, referring to believers, it shows up in 1 Corinthians 7.19. He says, circumcision is nothing, uncircumcision is nothing, but what matters is the keeping of the commandments of God. Now here in this context, Paul uses the phrase commandments of God, yet it is very clear he does not mean by that keeping the Old Testament law, because he had just told us that circumcision is nothing. So this can't refer to keeping the Old Testament law.

It would appear here what John's writing about here is something that is talking about this is the character of them from the heart. But I think when we look at the next phrase, that clarifies it for us. Holding to the testimony of Jesus. That's even more interesting here. This phrase, holding to the testimony of Jesus, is used only in the book of Revelation. But it's used about a half dozen times. It's used both referring to John, who at that time was part of the body of Christ.

It's also used to those living during the Tribulation Period. We don't have a great deal of explanation how the Lord will deal with saints during the Tribulation Period. It's good that we have what we do, isn't it? As those living during the Church Age, we have lots of information about how do we live and what is God doing. We don't have that much information about those living during this period of time. We do know, however, that these people are not going to be spending hours and hours and hours studying theology.

They're going to be running for their lives. It's going to be clear that their very survival and standing up against this very issue, are you going to succumb or not? That's going to be the primary question. Now, it would be good for us to step back for a minute here.

The Lord has His purpose for every time. His purpose for the time we're reading about is to bring about the transition from the kingdom of this world to the kingdom of His dear Son. That's here on earth. That's the transition we're reading about here. We are and have been reading about the details on that purpose and time.

Right now, while the Lord is setting the stage for that transition, because that's what He's doing right now, isn't He? the Lord is setting the stage for that transition to take place. We aren't told exactly when is the Lord going to take us out, but even now we can see multiple evidences of the Lord setting things in place. Israel returned as a nation, Jews going back to Israel in great numbers, and a great many other things being set up, even the red heifer that we talked about some weeks back. The Lord is setting the stage.

But just the same, The Lord is going to use tribulations, lowercase t, in our lives. That's his intent. Here, the time he's describing about is THE tribulation, uppercase T, is the time he's going to use as the transition. The Lord is going to use the tribulation period to transform the world from Satan's domain to Christ's kingdom. Right now, the Lord will use tribulation periods lowercase t, in our lives to transform us from glory to glory.

He is not forming some sort of a kingdom within us, okay? He is instead conforming us to Christ. You see, he's got different processes for different people, doesn't he? Even though both John and the Tribulation Saints were described as holding to the testimony of Jesus, he has different purposes for different people and different times. So the Lord is going to take us through these tribulations with the lowercase t, isn't he?

Cases in point. Have you noticed that your body is frequently not cooperating? Mine does that. Do you wonder why your circumstances are never quite optimum? That may be putting it politely. Do you wonder why everything with your parents and kids and extended family and employers and neighbors is not just delightful all the time? Do you wonder that?

It's because of this. God is using those tribulations, lowercase t, plural, to conform us to the image of His Son. That's the process that He's got going on. That's in contrast to this transition, this forming of the world to be the place where His Son will reign. You see the difference there? He's doing something in us, something in our hearts, that will prepare us to live basically out of a different place. He is doing something on earth to prepare it for a different future. We're going different paths in the world, aren't we?

But we need to just recall, what is the Lord doing with us now? He is allowing those lowercase t tribulations to accomplish in our lives what He intends to accomplish. Let's thank Him for that. Lord, we do give you thanks and we do give you praise for the things that you are doing, the things that you are accomplishing. Lord, we are not guaranteed to be free of tribulations, of those tribulations with a lowercase t, and indeed those are promised. But Lord, we needn't be fearful, we needn't be puzzled, because we know that you are using it all to conform us to the image of your dear son. We give you thanks for that. and give you thanks for everything that you're doing out of your heart of grace and love towards us. We pray this in Jesus' name.