Revelation 12: Christ Ascends Victorious, Edom’s Red Dragon Falls

Rev. Mark Jasa, pastor of Mount Olive Lutheran Church in Pasadena, California, joins host Rev. AJ Espinosa to study Revelation 12. “Now war arose in heaven, Michael and his angels fighting against the dragon.” Chapter 12 introduces a ferocious dragon. Like the Seleucid beast of Daniel, it has ten horns, symbolizing earthly authority and force of power. Unlike any other beast though, it has seven crowned heads, symbolizing the heavenly authority of God. The dragon is “red,” the color symbolizing Edom, the perennial enemy of God’s people. The Idumean King Herod tried and failed to kill the Lord Jesus as an infant. The army of 20,000 Idumean soldiers brought violence upon Jerusalem, but the church escaped to Pella. Whether in the form of Edom, Rome, or even Jerusalem in its apostasy, the spiritual power of Satan always accuses God’s people—but the accuser has been defeated in the ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ. All who are baptized in the Ascended Messiah’s name “have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb.”