Good evening and welcome to EBible Fellowship's Bible study in the Book of Revelation.  Tonight is study #12 of Revelation, chapter 11, and we are going to read Revelation 11:9-10:

And they of the people and kindreds and tongues and nations shall see their dead bodies three days and an half, and shall not suffer their dead bodies to be put in graves. And they that dwell upon the earth shall rejoice over them, and make merry, and shall send gifts one to another; because these two prophets tormented them that dwelt on the earth.

We are moving on to verse 10, where it says: “And they that dwell upon the earth shall rejoice over them, and make merry, and shall send gifts one to another.”  If we have the time, we are going to try to look at three words in verse 10 and these are the words “rejoice” and “make merry” and “gifts.”  I think that after looking up these words, we will have a good understanding of what is being said in this verse and why it is being said.

Let us start with the first word, “rejoice.”  It says, “They that dwell upon the earth shall rejoice over them.”  It means exactly what it says.  For instance, it says in Matthew 2:10:

When they saw the star, they rejoiced with exceeding great joy.

Of course, this refers to the wise men that followed the star to the house where the young child Jesus was found.  You can imagine their happiness and joy: “They rejoiced with exceeding great joy,” when they saw the star.  This word, when used of God and His Gospel, is a very positive thing.  Of course, in Matthew 2:10, it is a good thing that the wise men “rejoiced with exceeding great joy.” 

In Luke, chapter 15, the same word is used.  It says in Luke 15:3-6:

And he spake this parable unto them, saying, What man of you, having an hundred sheep, if he lose one of them, doth not leave the ninety and nine in the wilderness, and go after that which is lost, until he find it? And when he hath found it, he layeth it on his shoulders, rejoicing. And when he cometh home, he calleth together his friends and neighbours, saying unto them, Rejoice with me; for I have found my sheep which was lost.

The word “rejoicing” is actually in verse 5: “He layeth it on his shoulders, rejoicing.”  It is a different word that is used in verse 6.  The Lord Jesus will later explain that these parables concerning the finding of a lost coin or a lost sheep have to do with salvation and that there is joy in heaven over one sinneth that repenteth, as it goes on to say in Luke 15:7:

I say unto you, that likewise joy shall be in heaven over one sinner that repenteth, more than over ninety and nine just persons, which need no repentance.

So rejoicing relates to God’s salvation.  In this context, it is a good thing and it is a positive rejoicing.  The same Greek word is found in the same chapter and it is in the context of the parable of the prodigal son.  The father is speaking to the older brother and it says in Luke 15:31-32:

And he said unto him, Son, thou art ever with me, and all that I have is thine. It was meet that we should make merry, and be glad: for this thy brother was dead, and is alive again; and was lost, and is found.

The word “glad” is the same Greek word translated as “rejoicing” earlier in this chapter and translated as “rejoice” in our verse in Revelation 11.  The phrase “make merry” is also from the same Greek word.  So all of these are good Scriptures in which we can understand why there is “rejoicing” by the wise man when they see the star because it leads them to the Messiah and we can understand why the man “rejoices” when he finds his lost sheep because it is teaching us that there is joy in heaven over one sinner that repenteth; we can understand why the father, upon receiving his prodigal son,  “rejoices” and he says, “For this thy brother was dead, and is alive again; and was lost, and is found.”  Rejoicing in God’s salvation is a very excellent thing for believers to do and God’s people do rejoice in the fact that God has saved a great multitude out of Great Tribulation.  We rejoice greatly in this.

But there is another use for this word “rejoice” which we see in Revelation 11.  It is when this same word is used in connection with the enemies of the truth – the enemies of the kingdom of God – and it takes on a particularly dark aspect.  For instance, it says in Luke 22:3:

Then entered Satan into Judas surnamed Iscariot, being of the number of the twelve. And he went his way, and communed with the chief priests and captains, how he might betray him unto them. And they were glad…

The word “glad” is the same word, Strong’s #5463, which is translated in our verse in Revelation 11:10.

And they were glad, and covenanted to give him money.

You can just see the chief priests and captains.  They had been vexed by the teaching of Christ; they were troubled by his popularity and they were both amazed and incensed at His many miracles and now, finally, they had an opportunity and they “rejoiced” over the fact that Judas, one of the twelve and one of Jesus’ inner circle of Apostles, was willing to betray Him.  This was the opportunity they had been seeking to arrest Him and bring Him before their council and sentence Him to death.  We can just them rejoicing over something they should not have been rejoicing over, and this is the nature of men of the world – the natural man – and the sinner that is in his sins; he has an entirely different set of things that please him than the child of God.  The child of God is happy and rejoices in the things of God, but the child of the devil is made happy over wicked things – things that are of the world and things that are evil.  This is what we read, for instance, in 1Corinthians 13, which is the chapter called the “Love Chapter,” and it says in 1 Corinthians 13:4-6:

Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up, Doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil; Rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth;

Here is the difference between the child of God and an individual that is unsaved.  The child of God rejoices in the truth of the Word of God, but the unsaved person delights in iniquity.  Just look at the world’s pleasures; and the bible tells us that there are “pleasures of sin for a season.”  If we take our eyes off Christ we could be ensnared and trapped by a worldly pleasure because there is a certain pleasure in the flesh.  There is something in iniquity that the unsaved nature of an individual delights in and the unsaved individual delights in both body and soul, but the true believer does not delight in iniquity but rejoices in the truth.  However, we still have our physical bodies which can be drawn to that kind of thing.  Again, look at the world.  The world delights in alcohol and partying and drunkenness and drugs.   The world delights in immoral behavior and immoral sexual activity.  The world delights in violence and all the things which God says are not good.  Evil things are not of God, but of the world. 

God lists the good things in the Scriptures, the “fruit of the spirit,” and these things are what the heart of the child of God delights in.   We especially delight in the truth of the Word of God, the Bible, but there is no such delight for the individual that is unsaved.  They just cannot understand why we would want to spend so much time studying information in the Bible regarding judgment: “Why do you have to get so involved in that?  Why not just talk about love and more positive things?”  The child of God delights in truth, whatever the truth is (and it can be a very hard truth) and, yet, there is a delight and there is a rejoicing because it is, in fact, truth.

Let us just look at one other place before we go back to our verse.  In the Book of John, we also find the word “rejoice” used with both a positive connotation and a negative connotation.   It says in John 16:19-20:

Now Jesus knew that they were desirous to ask him, and said unto them, Do ye enquire among yourselves of that I said, A little while, and ye shall not see me: and again, a little while, and ye shall see me? Verily, verily, I say unto you, That ye shall weep and lament, but the world shall rejoice: and ye shall be sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy.

Christ is talking about the fact that He must go to the cross and the true believers will weep and be sorrowful, “but the world shall rejoice” because they have gotten rid of Him.  The nation of Israel and its leaders can go back to their normal activity, where they give a lot of “lip service” to the Word of God and they can do a lot of religious activities which mean nothing.  That is how they want it and that is how they like it.  It is just like the churches today; they want all the trappings and all the ceremonies; they want the name of Christ and to call themselves Christians, but they do not want Christ; they do not want the truth of the Bible and Christ is the embodiment of that truth.  They could do without that.  They just want to be in the “business” of religion and to have things designed by their own minds and they want their own doctrines.  It was the same thing with Israel of old and they could rejoice now because there had been so much contention between Christ and the religious leaders and the religious leaders were disturbing the Roman authorities about him, but now that was all over and done with and there would be rejoicing. 

Then it goes on to say in John 16:21-22:

A woman when she is in travail hath sorrow, because her hour is come: but as soon as she is delivered of the child, she remembereth no more the anguish, for joy that a man is born into the world.  And ye now therefore have sorrow: but I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice, and your joy no man taketh from you.

Here is the “rejoicing” on behalf of the believers.  They will rejoice, but not as the world which rejoices in tragedy.  The world rejoices when God’s kingdom suffers an (apparent) defeat.   The world rejoiced when Christ was on the cross; there was mockery and reviling.  But then that threat seemed to be taken care of and He was no more and that led to the world’s rejoicing and Satan’s rejoicing – he was victorious, he thought.  Of course, it only appeared to be a victory, but it was not that way in reality.  The cross was a death blow to Satan and it was the time he was bound.  Shortly thereafter, on the Day of Pentecost in God’s “times and seasons,” God would fulfill the Feast by pouring out of the Holy Spirit, as a result of what Jesus had done in going to the cross and demonstrating the atonement that had taken place from the foundation of the world.

There was no actual defeat and this is also how it is in Revelation 11, where Satan, as the beast, has been loosed and came against the camp of the saints.  He overcame them and killed them and their dead bodies were lying in the street.  The churches were defeated and the kingdom of heaven appeared to have suffered a lethal blow and what will God do? 

But, it is all according to God’s perfect will.  There is no need for concern and there is no need to worry.  God was actually carrying out His judgment upon a rebellious and unfaithful people, the New Testament churches and congregations.  It was all the fulfillment of prophecy.  It is just as Jesus had to go to the cross to fulfill those things that were written of Him.  So, too, at the time of the end of the church age, Satan had to be loosed and the end time season of the Great Tribulation had to begin and God must give up the churches and turn them over to Satan for that destruction, in order for the rest of God’s program to work out.  After that apparent outward defeat, now what would happen to the Gospel in the world?  The churches, with their membership of about two billion people, had been growing and, certainly, God’s plan would have been to evangelize the entire earth through the churches.  Yet, in one swift swoop, they are killed and they are lying dead in the streets.  It appeared Satan had won and “his deadly wound was healed.” 

But do not go by the outward appearance.  We have to look at the overall plan of God.  It was all happening as God had intended for it to happen.  Then 2,300 evening mornings later, on September 7, 1994, was the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, once again, just as there had been the outpouring of the Holy Spirit on the Day of Pentecost to begin to bring in the “firstfruits.”  Now was the second outpouring of the Holy Spirit during the Latter Rain to bring in the final harvest of God’s elect – that great multitude.  God would actually save more people outside of the churches and congregations than He ever saved within the churches during the entire period of the church age, which was almost 2,000 years.  In just a “little season,” God would save scores of millions of people from around the world. 

God had made due preparation for this occasion by raising up the electronic medium, which allowed a handful of true believers (for the most part) to send forth the unadulterated Word of God, as God would also open the Scriptures at the time of the end.   The truths of the Bible were being proclaimed to all the world outside of the churches and congregations and, therefore, it was as though the land “kept Sabbath” and “had rest” during this time.  There was great adherence to the Bible’s teaching on salvation: salvation is by the faith of Christ.  For the first time in history, there was one voice, as God’s people joined together in unison to proclaim that “Salvation is of the Lord.”  That pure Word of God accomplished its purpose and did not return void and God used His Word to save a great multitude, as the Bible says in Revelation, chapter 7. 

We can rejoice over this and this is a good thing to rejoice over, but back in our verse, it says in Revelation 11:10:

And they that dwell upon the earth shall rejoice over them, and make merry…

They think they have won.  The Gospel is finished.  Remember, it says at the end of the verse that the reason they are rejoicing and making merry and sending gifts to one another is “because these two prophets tormented them that dwelt on the earth.”   That Word of God and that message from the Bible just would not go away!  Can you imagine?  For century, after century, after century, the Word of God tormented the unsaved people.  They could not escape it and it was God’s plan to continue the witness of the Word within the congregations until a certain time.  There were people that hated it.  They despised it and they were troubled and distressed by it and they spoke evil of the Bible.  They wanted to get away from it and, yet, it always seemed to be there.

But, now was the opportunity: the “two witnesses,” typified by Moses and Elijah (the law and the prophets), the Word of God, had been killed and now there was no power behind the Word that the churches were proclaiming.   Suddenly, the respect for the pastors and the respect for those in the congregations went away.  It was as though it just disappeared.  The respect and “fear of God” was a result of God’s presence in the midst of the churches and there was a sense of that presence within the congregations.  But what happened at the end of the church age and beginning of the Great Tribulation was that God left the churches.  Now what were left were just men; they still had the same titles – pastor, elder, deacon, priest or pope – and, yet, they were just men and they would seem to be just men because God, who had blessed His Word within the churches to some degree, was gone.  God had been the One who caused that “fear” to be upon those outside of the congregations, as He dwelt mysteriously and spiritually within the midst of the church, and now He was gone.  It was as though God fought for “Israel” and the enemies were beaten back, and beaten back, and beaten back, but then one day the enemies came against “Israel” and God was not with them, so the enemy triumphed and this is what took place at the end of the church age; this is why there was rejoicing and making merry and sending gifts to one another, “because these two prophets had tormented them that dwelt on the earth.”  Now was their chance and now was their time to torment those in the churches and to torment the saints of God. 

In Obadiah, which is that one-chapter Book that is right before the Book of Jonah, it says in verse 10 through 12:

For thy violence against thy brother Jacob shame shall cover thee, and thou shalt be cut off for ever. In the day that thou stoodest on the other side, in the day that the strangers carried away captive his forces, and foreigners entered into his gates, and cast lots upon Jerusalem, even thou wast as one of them. But thou shouldest not have looked on the day of thy brother in the day that he became a stranger; neither shouldest thou have rejoiced over the children of Judah in the day of their destruction; neither shouldest thou have spoken proudly in the day of distress.

You see, Esau rejoiced that his brother Jacob (and Judah) has been overcome and destroyed.  Remember what God said: “Jacob I have loved, but Esau I have hated.”  The unsaved brother rejoiced that, finally, the brother who had found favor with God is under duress and suffering at the hand of the enemy.  This was also going on secretly within the New Testament churches and congregations.  The unsaved within the churches were happy this was taking place.