Good evening and welcome to EBible Fellowship's Bible study in the Book of Revelation.  Tonight is study #23 of Revelation, chapter 6, and we are going to begin by reading Revelation 6:12-14:

And I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, and, lo, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood; And the stars of heaven fell unto the earth, even as a fig tree casteth her untimely figs, when she is shaken of a mighty wind. And the heaven departed as a scroll when it is rolled together…

We have been looking at these verses for some time now.  We are looking at the spiritual meaning of the “sun, moon and stars.” In our last study, we saw how the sun represents God, the Lord Jesus Christ Himself, but what of the moon?  What does the moon represent?  The moon is more difficult to find spiritual definition for, as we search the Bible; and that is what we are always called upon to do.  We are never to say, “Well, I think the moon represents this, or this is a good idea that it might represent such and such.”  No – we are never to do that.  We are to find out what the Bible says and we are able to do that when we look up the word “moon” and we see how God is using it.

What we are going to find, as we go into this study of the “moon,” is that it represents the “Law of God,” and the Law of God is basically a synonym for the Word of God, the Bible.  The Bible is a Law Book.

Now the “moon” is that interesting object mankind can see in the night sky.  It is not considered a planet by astronomers due to its limited size, although it nearly qualifies as a planet, but it is said to be a satellite of the earth.  Now have you ever wondered why it is that the moon lights up at night?  Why do we see a “light of the moon?”  We understand the light of the sun.  The sun is burning with brilliance; the sun is giving off actual light.  Light comes forth from the sun to light the earth, but what about the moon?  Is the moon giving off any light?  Is the moon producing light and is that why we are seeing it at night when we look up at the heavens?  The answer is, “No.”  The moon is a dead planet; it has no ability in itself to produce light as the sun does.  The moon only reflects the light of the sun.  When we look up into the night sky and we see a bright, shining moon, it is a reflection of the sun, due to the type of material that is on the moon that is able to reflect the sun’s light.  It gives the appearance as if the moon is putting forth this light of herself. 

Now it is interesting when we read the Bible what God has to say about the light of the moon.  For instance, we read in Isaiah 13:10:

For the stars of heaven and the constellations thereof shall not give their light: the sun shall be darkened in his going forth, and the moon shall not cause her light to shine.

This is a very familiar verse to us.  We have been looking at these type of verses for some time and, perhaps, we never noticed that here it is basically stating the moon is going to “withhold” her light: “the moon shall not cause her light to shine,” as if the moon were producing light and as if the moon were generating light to the earth.  Scientifically, this cannot be.   How are we to understand what God is saying, when He says, “the moon shall not cause her light to shine”?  And, of course, we would have some secularists or other individuals that always want to find fault with the Bible and to criticize: “Oh, you see, that is a mistake.  That is error in the Scripture.  God is saying that the moon will not cause her own light to shine.  And, by the way, there is no mistake in this statement because it says in Matthew 24:29:

Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken:

And, again, we find it said “the moon shall not give her light,” and the word “her” is in the Greek text.  It is a translation of the Greek word “hautou” and “autos” is the word for “self” and this is in the feminine and it is unmistakably feminine and, therefore, the King James translators properly and correctly translated it as “her”: “the moon shall not give her light.”  Again, this is indicating, first of all, that the moon has a will of its own and, secondly, as if that will produced light that it could withhold and keep back from the inhabitants of the earth.  We have to wonder what God is doing with this kind of language.  He repeats it again in the parallel passage to Matthew 24, in Mark 13:24:

But in those days, after that tribulation, the sun shall be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light,

Why is the word “moon” in these verses always spoken of in the “feminine?”  Why is God identifying the moon as though it were a woman or female?  We have to keep searching the Bible and keep looking into the Scriptures in order to find our answer and I think we do find our answer back in Genesis, chapter 37, in the days of Joseph.  Actually, we read in Genesis 37:2:

These are the generations of Jacob…

Jacob is used by God as a figure of the elect and, basically, God is stating here: “These are the generations of the elect,” and then He begins to talk about Joseph when he was 17 years old and the history of Joseph being purchased as a slave and brought into Egypt and then the famine that comes along and Joseph rising to the right hand of Pharaoh, and so forth. 

And “these are the generations of God’s elect,” as it all has information that relates to the Biblical timeline of history and the end of the world when God will complete His program of salvation for His elect people.  Well, Joseph was a young man of 17 when God began to record these dreams that Joseph had and we find in Genesis 37:9-11:

And he dreamed yet another dream, and told it his brethren, and said, Behold, I have dreamed a dream more; and, behold, the sun and the moon and the eleven stars made obeisance to me. And he told it to his father, and to his brethren: and his father rebuked him, and said unto him, What is this dream that thou hast dreamed? Shall I and thy mother and thy brethren indeed come to bow down ourselves to thee to the earth? And his brethren envied him; but his father observed the saying.

Now the first thing we are interested in is that the sun and moon are said to represent Jacob and Joseph’s mother and that is interesting because Joseph’s mother died some time earlier giving birth to Benjamin.  He had stepmothers, as Jacob was married to other women, but it does not mean that Rebecca could not be in view here as Jacob may be thinking that this could be something related to the after life or the time of the end.  You know, the Bible does teach that those that die in Christ never die, but they continue to live.  But whatever Jacob was thinking about when he said: “Shall I and thy mother and thy brethren indeed come to bow down ourselves to thee to the earth?”, one thing is for sure: God, here, is identifying the father Jacob as being typified by the “sun” and the mother (who is unnamed in the passage) is being typified by the “moon” and Joseph’s eleven brothers are being typified by the “stars.”  This is helpful because, here, God is relating the “moon” to Joseph’s mother – to a woman.  But now it is more information because God is speaking of the moon as a “mother” and that is helpful when we read verses such as we read in Proverbs.  Let us go over to Proverbs 1:7-9:

The fear of JEHOVAH is the beginning of knowledge: but fools despise wisdom and instruction. My son, hear the instruction of thy father, and forsake not the law of thy mother: For they shall be an ornament of grace unto thy head, and chains about thy neck.

The Lord, here, is connecting the Law (the Word of God, the Bible) with “thy mother.”  He does it again in Proverbs 6:20:

My son, keep thy father's commandment, and forsake not the law of thy mother:

Again, “law” is tied to “mother” and this identification helps us to understand why God says, for instance, in His Law: “Honor they father and thy mother.”  We have always understood that the father typified God Himself; He is our Heavenly Father and, yet, it says, “Honor thy father and thy mother,” and remember what God says concerning this in Ephesians 6:1-3:

Children, obey your parents in the Lord: for this is right. Honour thy father and mother; (which is the first commandment with promise;) That it may be well with thee, and thou mayest live long on the earth.

Now if someone obeys their earthly mother, it is a good thing and proper.  That is a proper thing to do, but obeying one’s mother and father is not going to prolong anyone’s life physically in this world.  It could benefit them and make their life much more joyous and they may live in a good way, so there are certain benefits to that, but there is nothing at all that would indicate that someone who honors their parents (compared to someone that does not honor their parents) lives a longer life. 

Yet, when God says, “That thou mayest live long on the earth,” we tend to think this is a reference, not to this earth but to the new heaven and new earth where God’s people will dwell for evermore.  Therefore, if an individual honors his Heavenly Father and mother (which is the Word of God, the Bible)…and how do you honor your earthly mother, the one that gave birth to us?  If she tells us to do something and we do not do it, are we honoring her?  No, obviously we are not; we are dishonoring her.  If our mother wants us to hearken to the things she is saying and we do not hearken, there is no honor of her in that at all.  It is the exact same thing with the Law of God.  The Law of God admonishes us.  It rebukes us.  It directs the course of our lives. 

The Bible is very much like a “mother” to us.  It can nourish us and comfort us and encourage us and, also, it can sharply rebuke us and it directs us and gives sound advice and wise counsel.  Like a mother, it has great concern and love for us, if we are one of God’s elect, and even for those that are not God’s elect (as God has a sort of love for all mankind) and it would be helpful for even an unsaved person to follow the Laws of the Bible.   So the Word of God is like a mother that is to be honored and if anyone were to submit in obedience to the Law of the Scripture, the Word of God, and do the things that God says and do them from the heart, it would mean that they had become saved and they would “live long on the earth.”  They would live for evermore.

Well, we read in Proverbs 30:11:

There is a generation that curseth their father, and doth not bless their mother.

Again, God is bringing father and mother upon an equal footing – what they do unto the father, they do unto the mother – and we can understand this when we realize that the Word of God is equal to God.  He has placed His name under His Law.  He has subjected Himself to His own Word.  He will not violate the Law of God in any way, for any reason, but, rather, God Himself obeys and keeps the perfect Law that He has established forever. 

Now let us look at Proverbs 30:17:

The eye that mocketh at his father, and despiseth to obey his mother, the ravens of the valley shall pick it out, and the young eagles shall eat it.

Once again, we can see here how God is the Father and if someone mocks Him, they will suffer the consequences and, likewise for someone that despises to obey his mother.  And notice the word “obey.”  They are rejecting the counsel of their mother – the direction that their mother is telling them and they are rejecting the Word of God and they also will suffer the consequences for failing to obey. 

Now let us just go to one other place to see how these things are tied together as God likens a mother to His Word.  Also, since Genesis 37 identifies the “moon” as Joseph’s mother, we have Biblical validation for recognizing that the “moon” which is spoken of often in the feminine, is a type and figure of the Law of God, as a mother is a type and figure of the Law of God.  In Judges, chapter 4, we read something very unusual and rare in the Bible and that is a woman being given a prominent place in a battle.  We read of Deborah the Prophetess and let me read Judges 4:4:

And Deborah, a prophetess, the wife of Lapidoth, she judged Israel at that time.

Now the Israelites were being oppressed by the Canaanites at that time and now God was going to raise up some deliverers and Deborah took center stage and she was a prophetess (which also was rare, according to the Bible).  Most prophets you read of in the Bible are men.  Some people try to point to Deborah in order to justify that a woman should teach or preach or do whatever a man can do.  They are failing to understand the rarity of this historical event that we are going to read a little bit about.  They are also failing to understand the deeper spiritual meaning of what God is saying here which explains perfectly why Deborah took such a heightened role in this battle with the Canaanites.  We read in Judges 4:6-11:

And she sent and called Barak the son of Abinoam out of Kedeshnaphtali, and said unto him, Hath not JEHOVAH God of Israel commanded, saying, Go and draw toward mount Tabor, and take with thee ten thousand men of the children of Naphtali and of the children of Zebulun? And I will draw unto thee to the river Kishon Sisera, the captain of Jabin's army, with his chariots and his multitude; and I will deliver him into thine hand. And Barak said unto her, If thou wilt go with me, then I will go: but if thou wilt not go with me, then I will not go. And she said, I will surely go with thee: notwithstanding the journey that thou takest shall not be for thine honour; for JEHOVAH shall sell Sisera into the hand of a woman. And Deborah arose, and went with Barak to Kedesh. And Barak called Zebulun and Naphtali to Kedesh; and he went up with ten thousand men at his feet: and Deborah went up with him.  Now Heber the Kenite, which was of the children of Hobab the father in law of Moses, had severed himself from the Kenites, and pitched his tent unto the plain of Zaanaim, which is by Kedesh.

And, again, we see that God is making sure that people cannot miss that, historically, as this woman is featured, it is not for “man’s honor.”  Normally and typically, men do these things, but God is making this allowance in order to teach us something very important.  Barak is a type of Christ and notice that it says that he has “ten thousand” men of the children of Naphtali and the children of Zebulun.  We read in Judges 4:14-15:

And Deborah said unto Barak, Up; for this is the day in which JEHOVAH hath delivered Sisera into thine hand: is not JEHOVAH gone out before thee? So Barak went down from mount Tabor, and ten thousand men after him. And JEHOVAH discomfited Sisera, and all his chariots, and all his host, with the edge of the sword before Barak; so that Sisera lighted down off his chariot, and fled away on his feet.

The connection or the identification and relationship that God is establishing here is hard to miss as Barak comes with “ten thousand” men and we know that the Bible teaches that Christ comes in the Day of Judgment with “ten thousands of his saints.”  Barak is a picture of Christ and this battle is a picture of Judgment Day.  But why on earth would God have Barak say that he would not go unless Deborah comes with him to the battle? 

We can understand once we know that the prophetess’ name, “Deborah,” is the feminine form of the Hebrew word “debar” and “debar” in the Hebrew is the word that is often translated as “word.”  It is often used to describe the Word of the LORD, the Word of God and “Deborah” is a type and figure of the “Word of God,” the Bible, and in the Day of Judgment, the Lord Jesus comes with “ten thousands of his saints” (all of His elect), but He comes with the “Word of God.”  That is exactly what we are finding today: God is using His Word as a sword in the day of battle to destroy His enemies.  Since it is a spiritual judgment that He has brought upon the earth and this spiritual judgment is revealed from the Scriptures, we can see why God is emphasizing that Barak does not go to this battle unless “Deborah” comes with him.

 Now it says over in Judges 5:7:

The inhabitants of the villages ceased, they ceased in Israel, until that I Deborah…

(And, again, “Deborah” is the feminine form of “debar,” which means “word.”

 …until that I Deborah arose, that I arose a mother in Israel.

This, again, presents evidence that the Word of God is like a “mother” and the “mother” is connected to the “moon.”  God says that “in that day,” in the Day of Judgment, the “moon” shall not give her light and now we understand.  God is not saying that the moon produces light that it will withhold, but what the moon typifies and represents is the “Word,” the Bible itself, and Christ is the embodiment of the Word.  Christ completely identifies with the “moon,” therefore.  He completely identifies with the Word of God and Christ will withhold the reflected light that comes from the sun; as God lightens His Word, Christ (the “moon”) will withhold that Word from the world and the light reflected from the Person of God to the “moon,” the Scriptures, will not shine: “Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light.”