Good evening and welcome to EBible Fellowship's Bible study in the Book of Revelation.  Tonight is study #14 of Revelation, chapter 11, and we are going to be reading from Revelation 11:10-11:

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. And after three days and an half the Spirit of life from God entered into them, and they stood upon their feet; and great fear fell upon them which saw them.

We saw in the last couple of studies how the unsaved people rejoice over calamity that they perceive as striking the kingdom of heaven.  We looked at a few Scriptures that have the word “rejoice” in it.  I want to take a quick look at the words “merry” and “gifts” before we talk about “prophets,” which we will probably do in our next study.

The word for “make merry” is found in a positive connotation in Luke 15, in the parable of the prodigal son.  It says in Luke 15:32:

It was meet that we should make merry, and be glad…

The word “glad” is the same word as “rejoice” found in Revelation 11.

… for this thy brother was dead, and is alive again; and was lost, and is found.

The father is speaking to his elder son and he is explaining why they were celebrating and why they were rejoicing and making merry.  So “making merry” and “rejoicing” goes hand in hand.

Just as “rejoicing” can be positive or negative, so “making merry” can be positive or negative. In Acts 7, Stephen is being moved by God to give account of the history of Israel.  He is talking about the time when Israel came out of Egypt.  Moses had gone up to the Mount to receive the Ten Commandments and Israel fell into spiritual idolatry.  It says in Acts 7:40-41:

Saying unto Aaron, Make us gods to go before us: for as for this Moses, which brought us out of the land of Egypt, we wot not what is become of him. And they made a calf in those days, and offered sacrifice unto the idol, and rejoiced in the works of their own hands.

Here, the English word translated as “rejoiced” is a translation of the Greek word that was translated as “make merry” in Revelation 11:10.  This was a completely evil and wicked reason for merriment; they were rejoicing as they were going after another god.  It is the same idea as rejoicing over the apparent end of the witness of God in this world, as the “two witnesses” were lying dead in the streets.

Going back to Revelation 11:10:

And they that dwell upon the earth shall rejoice over them, and make merry, and shall send gifts one to another;

When we look at the word “gifts,” it is often used concerning that which is offered along with sacrifices.  It is also used in a very interesting way in Ephesians 2:8-9:

For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast.

Here, it is the “gift” of God which has to do with salvation: “For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves.”  The Bible teaches us that we are saved through the faith of Jesus Christ and not of our own faith.  Our own faith would be a work and no man is justified by the works of the law.

In the setting of the death of the “two witnesses,” the unsaved peoples of the kindreds, tongues and nations that have overcome the churches of the world under the leadership of Satan, are now “rejoicing and making merry.”  We have seen both of these things in positive and negative settings.  There is rejoicing in heaven over one sinner that repents; the father of the prodigal son makes merry and rejoices because his son “was dead, and is alive again; and was lost, and is found.”  So both of these words can be related to salvation and this is also true of the word “gifts,” so now we can understand what is going on within the churches and congregations; the “Gentiles” (the unsaved people that now populate the churches) are developing their own gospels and there is “rejoicing” and there is “making merry” when people walk down the aisle.  They are sending “gifts” of faith one to another, as people profess to “accept Christ” or “say the Sinner’s Prayer” or are “baptized.”  They are “sending gifts one to another.”  They are sending “gifts of salvation,” one to another.  It is all manmade.  It is completely idolatrous.  It is completely false.  There is no actual salvation taking place, but this is the condition of the churches and congregations of the world after God’s Spirit left them.  They do not recognize or admit that God has abandoned them, but they continue to manufacture their own idols – their own “golden calf” of salvation.  Now they are the ones that tell their members, “You are saved.”  They think they are the pillar and foundation of the truth.  They are imparting salvation.  It is all a lie, but this is what God has allowed them to believe.  He has sent strong delusion that they might believe a lie.

Let us go on to the end of the verse in Revelation 11:10:

…because these two prophets tormented them that dwelt on the earth.

It was the truths of the Bible that were the source of the “torment,” and not the Bible itself, because if the Bible is used wrongfully, it does not “torment” anyone.  Remember, God told us in Timothy that the law must be used lawfully; when someone speaks forth the Word of God, it must be done carefully, comparing Scripture with Scripture and harmonizing it with everything else in the Bible.  When that is performed, then the Bible becomes a source of “torment” to those that hear it when God’s Spirit is behind it.  The Lord was behind the sending forth of His Word outside of the churches for about seventeen years until Judgment Day began on May 21, 2011, and the “two prophets” tormented them that dwelt on the earth.

Let us take a little detour as we look at the reference to the “two prophets.”  The Word of God is prophecy and when God speaks of prophets, it can be the official prophets to whom God gave His Word, like Jeremiah, Daniel and others.  Even into the New Testament era, God utilized His people as prophets. A prophet in the New Testament era is simply someone that speaks forth the truth of the Word of God.  The Bible is prophecy and when we share its truths, we are prophesying. 

There can be true prophets today and there can be false prophets today, just as in the time when the Bible was still being completed.  Back in those days when the Bible had not been completed, God gave this test: if the prophet prophesied of a future event, if it came to pass, then that would be in line with a true prophet; if it did not come to pass, then it would not be in line with a true prophet.  This was necessary because the Bible was still being compiled.  How could anyone know for sure if someone had a message from God or a Word from the Lord?  The false prophets would claim their message was from God as readily as the true prophets, so God developed this test.  This test was no longer necessary once the Bible was completed;  it was no longer necessary to confirm it, based on whether a prophecy came to pass or not. 

Now the test is: Do they limit their prophecy to the Bible?  If anyone adds or subtracts from the Bible, they are immediately shown to be a false prophet, as God tells us this in Revelation 22.  But if they stay within the confines of the Bible alone and they follow the proper methodology of comparing Scripture with Scripture to make sure their conclusion agrees with everything else in the Bible, this is how we confirm if they are prophesying truly.  It does not mean they are going to be perfect in everything they say, but it is the methodology that is important.  There could still be an area in which they do not have the complete information or the complete truth and they can be corrected. 

Then again, someone could be failing to use the correct methodology of comparing Scripture with Scripture, but they are staying within the boundaries of the Bible, or at least paying lip service to it.  For example, a person that professes to be a Christian could point to the verse that says, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.”  Then he says, “See, here is where the Bible says it.”  He is staying within the boundaries of the Bible, but what is he failing to do?  He is failing to look everywhere else in the Bible and his conclusion that one can just believe on the Lord Jesus Christ to be saved will not harmonize with a great many passages in the Bible that tell us that we are “dead in sin,” or that faith is a work, or that we are not justified by the works of the law.  There are just dozens of verses that will not allow for his conclusion, so if an individual refuses to look elsewhere in the Bible to make sure his conclusion harmonizes, then that is a false prophecy.  In the case of developing a salvation plan based on that, you would have a false gospel and that individual is behaving as a false prophet.  We can use that terminology because the Bible is prophecy and we are to rightly declare it; we are to study to show ourselves approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed.  God has given us the methodology, so when it comes to other doctrines of the Bible, we check it out to find out if they are using the proper methodology to come to their conclusion.

For instance, the Bible says the woman is not to teach or usurp authority over the man, but you have some people today that are influenced by modern society and they say, “Oh, we cannot hold back women.  We have to allow them to have equal rights.”  Well, that is fine for the world or fine for the job market.  The Bible, as far as I know, says nothing about a woman being president of a corporation or President of the United States.  But the Bible does day that God does not allow a woman to teach or usurp authority over the man, as far as the Bible is concerned; a woman is not to teach the Bible to men – she can teach other women or children, but she is not to teach men.  That is God’s law.  Since the Bible does address this point, we are not allowed to go outside the Bible and look at our present society where a woman’s role has greatly increased and where there is much emphasis on women’s rights and then try to apply it to a women being a teacher over men of the Bible.  We have to confine our application to the Bible.  People who do this end up teaching a false doctrine because you cannot prove from the Bible that women are to teach or have authority over a man in regard to the Bible.  The nature of a true prophet is that he will stick to the Bible only and he will compare verses in the Bible and search the entire Bible to see if his conclusion fits (like a piece of a puzzle) with the rest of Scriptures.

A characteristic of a true prophet of God compared to a false prophet of God may not be what some would expect.  As a matter of fact, I know it is not what people think.  It is sort of similar to people’s ideas concerning Satan – the perception of the world regarding Satan.  If you ask someone to describe Satan to you, they will describe some evil looking man in a red suit, with diabolical eyes and a pitchfork – the most evil image they can imagine.  Of course, if anyone asked me to describe Satan, the right response would be, “He is a spirit being and you cannot describe him.”  But as far as Satan’s activities, people also think along the lines of “darkness” and a “haunted house” or some other wicked and evil place and they think that would be where you would find Satan.  But what is the truth and what does the Bible say?  The Bible says, in 2 Corinthians, chapter 11, that he comes as an angel of light and his emissaries as ministers of righteousness.  He comes looking like Christ.  He does not come speaking “hell and damnation,” saying, “Judgment, judgment, judgment!” He does not come, saying, “Wrath, wrath, wrath!”  He does not do that.  He comes saying, “God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life.”  Satan comes, saying, “The Lord Jesus Christ died for everyone.”  In other words, Satan comes with a positive gospel.  He is trying to convince people that everyone is saved – Christ died for everyone and Jesus loves everybody.  Satan wants people to have false security, false hope and false peace.  He wants people to have confidence that they are right with God so they stop worrying and thinking about it and stop being interested in truth.  They can have false security and false assurance, and during the day of salvation he raised up ministers to teach these things and to convince their congregations that the members were children of God.  They promised people “life” and they sold that bill of goods to the members of their congregations: “Come down this aisle and accept Christ and you will be saved.”  They even had crusades where there were fifty thousand people and a minister, who was an excellent salesman, was giving a moving address to everyone, saying, “Is it not time for you to become a child of God?  Is it not time for you to have that eternal security?”  He preached a fiery message designed to touch the “feelings” of people so that tears would run down their cheeks and they would get up out of their seats.  By the hundreds or by the thousands, they would pour down the aisles to accept Christ.  Oh, what great salvation!  Everyone is happy.  Everyone is full of joy.  There is great love.  It is all wonderful. 

This is how Satan works.  There is no message that “salvation is of the Lord.”  There is no message that we are dead in sin and we cannot do anything and God has to perform the work of salvation in us.  If we attempted to do it, it would be a work and no man is justified by the works of the law.  Satan does not make a true declaration of the Gospel because the people would not come down.  They would not be convinced of salvation and they would be disturbed by true prophecy and they would be troubled by the message that God would have his true prophets bring: salvation is in God’s hands and He will have mercy upon whom He will have mercy.  That is not very popular.  If you are going to try to have a crusade with that message, you are not going to fill the seats with fifty thousand people; maybe you could get five hundred people, if you really tried.  You could have a few hundred, but you are not going to have fifty thousand.  It is not going to be televised and it is not going to be widely circulated and people are not going to speak well of that kind of message like they would speak well of a message teaching “easy believism” and “instant pudding salvation.”  That kind of message is of the world and the world loves its own and they recognize and love that kind of gospel.  The true Gospel is not of the world; the world does not recognize it and they hate the true Gospel.  It will not be circulated to the degree the false gospel would be.

Let us turn to 1Kings 22, just to get a little glimpse into the difference between prophets of God and prophets of Satan.  This account is where King Jehoshaphat of Judah is joining forces with King Ahab of Israel and they are going to Ramothgilead to battle a common enemy.  It says in 1 Kings 22:5-8:

And Jehoshaphat said unto the king of Israel, Enquire, I pray thee, at the word of JEHOVAH to day. Then the king of Israel gathered the prophets together, about four hundred men, and said unto them, Shall I go against Ramothgilead to battle, or shall I forbear? And they said, Go up; for the Lord shall deliver it into the hand of the king. And Jehoshaphat said, Is there not here a prophet of JEHOVAH besides, that we might enquire of him? And the king of Israel said unto Jehoshaphat, There is yet one man, Micaiah the son of Imlah, by whom we may enquire of JEHOVAH: but I hate him; for he doth not prophesy good concerning me, but evil. And Jehoshaphat said, Let not the king say so.

Now in our next study, we are going to spend a little bit more time here and in a few other passages.  But, for now, just notice this.  First of all, there are four hundred prophets that are all speaking with the same voice and there is one prophet that does not agree with them.   This tells us, as we continue to read this chapter, the four hundred prophets are false prophets and just one prophet is a true prophet.  The majority of prophets are false, so you will find there are large numbers of theologians and a great many pastors and elders that join forces and they speak with one voice and they say, “The church age is not over, so come to church.”  Then you will have a small handful of believers that teach, “God is finished with the churches and we were to come out of the congregations.”  This passage shows us that this would be in keeping with how God has operated through His prophets of the past.