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Welcome to the Cross References podcast on the Book of Ezekiel. In this study, you learn how every small piece of the Bible tells one big story- and most importantly, how they all connect to the cross and Christ.
Whether you’re a newbie Christian or a veteran Bible reader, my goal is that God’s Word will make more sense to you after every episode.
Host: Luke Taylor
Year of the Dragon: Satan’s Fate in Revelation
Revelation 12, 20
30-Minute Theology
Introduction
You may or may not be familiar with the Chinese Zodiac, which assigns one of 12 creatures to each year. Some years are the year of the horse, or the year of the rat, or the year of the snake.
We’re about to start the Year of the Dragon- THIS WEEK- February 10, 2024, and it will last until January 28 of 2025.
The end times also talk about a year of the dragon. Not just 1 year, but 7 years.
This episode is going to cap off my multi-episode deep dive into Satan- who he is, where he came from, and today- where he’s going.
The devil is going to lose, and get everything he deserves. But it’s going to get worse before it gets better. The earth will endure seven years of the dragon. And Revelation lays it all out.
So today, we’re going to talk about what the book of Revelation teaches us about the devil’s end. And if YOU listen until the end, I’ll share a story about when I confronted a demon with these verses.
All of that today on the Cross References podcast.
[theme music]
(Continued)
Welcome to the Cross References podcast, where you learn how every small piece of the Bible tells one big story- and most importantly, how they all connect to the cross and Christ.
Whether you’re a new Christian or a veteran Bible reader, my goal is that God’s Word will make more sense to you after every episode.
My name is Luke Taylor, and I was born in the year of the horse. No one cares, but I just thought I’d throw that in there.
Revelation 12: The Dragon
The book of Revelation is about the end times, which is appropriate because it’s the last book of the Bible. Lots of prior books in the Bible teach us things about the last days and the antichrist and the millennial kingdom, but Revelation is the book that takes all those pieces and puts it all together.
The last days of planet earth are described in Revelation 6 through 19. It’s a seven-year period marked by much turmoil on planet earth, both supernatural and due to human wickedness. God basically allows the devil to take control of planet earth and install his own ruler on the planet for a seven-year period.
It’s kind of an evil mockery of the Trinity. Satan is playing the role of God the Father, the Antichrist plays the role of God the son, and there’s another guy called the False Prophet who does his best impression of the Holy Spirit.
I’m going to focus more-so on just the devil for today’s lesson, because this is part of the series on Satan, and as powerful as the Antichrist may appear to be, he’s really only Satan’s puppet in those last days. So turn with me to Revelation 12 if you’d like and we’ll look at what he is up to during this time.
Revelation 12:1-2
And a great sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars. She was pregnant and was crying out in birth pains and the agony of giving birth.
There is a lot of discussion about who this woman is. Many believe her to be Mary, because in a few moments she’s going to give birth to the Son of God. But this woman is actually not Mary specifically, but this is referring to the nation of Israel as a whole. I can prove this, because back in the first book of the Bible, there’s a similar dream which interprets for us who this woman is.
If we go all the way back to Joseph and his coat of many colors, you find that he’s having these dreams about the future. Your first cross reference today is a dream Joseph had.
Genesis 37:9-10
Then he (Joseph) had another dream, and he told it to his brothers. “Listen,” he said, “I had another dream, and this time the sun and moon and eleven stars were bowing down to me.” When he told his father as well as his brothers, his father rebuked him and said, “What is this dream you had? Will your mother and I and your brothers actually come and bow down to the ground before you?”
So it interprets for us the meaning of these symbols in Revelation. Jacob explicitly tells us. The Sun and Moon refer to Jacob and Rachel. There are eleven stars in Jacob’s dream; that’s because he’s referring to this 11 brothers, and Jacob himself is the twelfth. The sons of Jacob make up the 12 tribes of Israel. So this makes sense of this vision in Revelation 12. The woman clothed with the sun, moon and 12 stars is not Mary specifically, but the nation of Israel as a whole.
This is what it means to let Scripture interpret Scripture.
Revelation 12:3
3 And another sign appeared in heaven: behold, a great red dragon, with seven heads and ten horns, and on his heads seven diadems.
The dragon here is Satan. This one is a little more obvious of an interpretation compared to the woman. It’s very fitting symbolism because Satan first appeared in the Bible as a serpent, and dragons are also reptilian in appearance. With snakelike or lizard-like faces.
He is red. Earlier in Revelation, we see a red horse, and this horse brings war on the earth. Jesus is the Prince of Peace, so of course the devil is the color of war.
Seven heads, ten horns, seven crowns. This is talking about the government of the antichrist in the end times. The ten horns refer to ten world leaders who will help the antichrist’s rule. They will probably be set in charge over ten regions of the earth. Daniel 7:7-8 is your cross reference here. For the sake of time, I’ll let you track it down yourself if you want to because Revelation 13 is actually the chapter that goes into all this much deeper. The seven heads that the dragon has is also referring, I believe, to the nations that join together to make up the Antichrist’s empire. There will be elements of Assyria, Egypt, Babylon, Rome, Persia, Greece, and perhaps more. And again, Revelation 13 is a better place to get into all this.
The point for today is: Satan gets control of the world, and he operates through this figure called the Antichrist to run it.
Revelation 12:4
4 His tail swept down a third of the stars of heaven and cast them to the earth.
This is talking about the angelic rebellion against God. I have been going into this in a bit more detail on my other podcast, Weird Stuff in the Bible, so here’s your plug for that one if you want to know more. You’ll want to go back to an episode called Who Are the Sons of God?
Anyway, God created a lot of spiritual beings. The New Testament just kind of generically calls them angels, because the Greek is not as specific as the Hebrew. But in the Old Testament, there are regular angels, there are Cherubim, there are Seraphim, there are all kinds. And these spiritual beings are often referred to as “stars,” which is what they’re being referred to as here. Satan rebelled against God- he was the first rebel- but over time, 1/3 of all the spiritual beings also turned on God. This vision in Revelation 12 is a condensed form of the story; these rebellions happened over time, not all at once.
Continuing with verse 4
And the dragon stood before the woman who was about to give birth, so that when she bore her child he might devour it.
The child- in case I haven’t mentioned this yet- is Jesus. The woman who was pregnant is Israel. Again, it’s easy to see why many think she was Mary, but as I explained, it’s really referring to Israel as a whole. The Jewish people. And the child came to this earth through the Jewish people.
The devil didn’t want Jesus being born into the world. He probably thought it meant his time was up. But since God had made Himself so vulnerable by entering this world in a fragile human body, the devil tried to kill Jesus at his birth. So Satan impressed upon Herod that the Christ child was a threat to him, so Herod had all the baby boys in Bethlehem killed. Your cross reference for that is Matthew 2:16. But Revelation 12 shows us that Satan was also behind this idea, which is why it says the dragon stood before the woman to devour her child.
Revelation 12:5
She gave birth to a male child, one who is to rule all the nations with a rod of iron, but her child was caught up to God and to his throne,
Again, clearly Jesus right here who will rule all nations. But that didn’t happen the first time He came. He was caught up to God. I learned in my studies last year that he was literally said to be “raptured” up to God and His throne right here. This refers to the ascension of Jesus. And so Revelation 12:5 brings us from the beginning of the Bible all the way up to 2000 years ago.
But then, one of the significant gaps in Bible prophecy happens, where suddenly prophecy shifts from talking about one thing to jumping thousands of years forward to the end times, and that happens right here as we transition from verses 5 to 6 in Revelation 12.
The Second Holocaust
Verse 6
and the woman fled into the wilderness, where she has a place prepared by God, in which she is to be nourished for 1,260 days.
To catch you up: this is referring to the second half- the last three-and-a-half years- of the seven-year tribulation. There is a big shake-up halfway through the tribulation. In the first half, the Jewish people think that the Antichrist is a great friend to them, a practically messianic hero. But at the mid-point of the tribulation, he does something that’s known as the Abomination of Desolation.
This is the thing where Jesus said: when you see this, flee to the mountains. It will be an act of desecration of the Jewish temple. The antichrist will enter the Jewish temple and demand to be worshiped as God. The Jews will realize that the antichrist is not their Messiah, and so they’ll scatter.
Of course, the antichrist is being empowered by Satan, and this is all really Satan continuing to do what he’s always done: try to wipe out the Jewish people. Satan and the antichrist will spend the remainder of the tribulation- literally 1,260 days- trying to stamp them out.
And he’ll almost do it.
Now, that’s what is going on down on the earth. That’s in the natural realm. In the supernatural realm, there’s something else going on. While the tribulation events are unfolding down on earth, a war breaks out in heaven.
Revelation 12:7-9
7 Now war arose in heaven, Michael and his angels fighting against the dragon. And the dragon and his angels fought back, 8 but he was defeated, and there was no longer any place for them in heaven. 9 And the great dragon was thrown down, that ancient serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world—he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him.
Satan gets evicted from heaven. Now, some of you might be confused: I thought Satan already was evicted from heaven. And it seems that he was initially kicked out. But Satan appears to be able to make return trips. For example, Job 1-2. Satan is able to interact with God and converse with God. He has a role as the accuser of God’s people. I’m not sure what the point of that is in the spiritual realm, but it’s apparently useful to God in some way.
Not only the devil, but also his angels; they are all allowed access to heaven. And again, this gets into the weird territory, and that’s what I like to explore on my other podcast. Biblically, we see that God has staff meetings in heaven, and that even spirits in rebellion to God are allowed to attend and help direct the affairs of earth.
However, everything changes at the midpoint of the tribulation. Heaven’s doors close to Satan and his angels; they are barred from heaven. And all these guys throw a fit about the access to God that they have lost.
(I’ll mention now: if you want more information about any of this that I’ve been saying, send me an email to crossreferencespodcast@gmail.com, or leave a comment, and I will be glad to explain. I can do a future episode answering questions about this backing it up with more Scripture, or doing a mailbag segment, whatever you need. I’m only briefly touching on it today so that I don’t get too far off-track from the main point of today’s lesson).
One more verse from here: Revelation 12:13
13 And when the dragon saw that he had been thrown down to the earth, he pursued the woman who had given birth to the male child.
So in retaliation, Satan goes on a killing spree against the Jews, and the last three-and-a-half years involve a holocaust that was even worse than the first one.
Zechariah 13:8 says 2/3 of the jewish people will be killed by the antichrist. In Hitler’s holocaust, he killed 1/3 of the Jews. But in the Antichrist’s holocaust, he’ll kill 2/3.
Why is Satan so intent on wiping out the Jewish people? In Episode 99, I covered this. The episode was Why Satan Hates Israel. And I explained in that episode, the only way that Satan can prevent the Second Coming of Christ is by killing all the Jewish people. And so that is why Satan has become so intent on killing them throughout history. Jesus was prophesied to come through the Jewish people. Satan wanted to prevent the first coming of Christ. Satan was always waiting to devour that child. And when he failed on that one, he also knows about the prophecy that Jesus will not come again until the Jewish people repent and turn to the Messiah. This puts into context basically all of Jewish history:
Egypt- let’s enslave the Jewish people and not let them go home. Oh no, too many Jews, let’s kill their babies so they can’t get any bigger.
All these nations who came and tried to wipe out the Jews in their history in the Bible. The Amalekites, the Edomites, the Philistines…
In the book of Esther, when Haman got a plot to wipe out all the Jews. They weren’t even hurting anyone.
In between the testaments, Antiochus Epiphanes and his attempt to wipe out the Jews.
Herod trying to stop the Messiah from being born by killing all the babies in Bethlehem.
You look at the persecution of Jews throughout history.
Adolph Hitler and everything that happened in
October 7, 2023
All of these events have one thing in common: Satan was behind all of them. Because if he can wipe out the Jews, he can prevent the Second Coming of Christ.
And when the war in heaven happens at the midpoint of the Great Tribulation, the clock really starts ticking for Satan, because now he knows he only has 1,260 days left. And he gets very desperate. The way Jesus described it: then there will be great tribulation, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, no, and never will be.
This is what Jesus was talking about. How close will Satan get to accomplishing his goal? Let’s turn to Revelation 20 and look at that before we close down.
Revelation 20: The Bottomless Pit
In Revelation 19, we see Jesus riding in. This is THE Second Coming of Christ. Let me actually start with the end of Revelation 19, talking about the antichrist, right here called the beast:
Revelation 19:20-21
20 And the beast was captured, and with it the false prophet who in its presence had done the signs by which he deceived those who had received the mark of the beast and those who worshiped its image. These two were thrown alive into the lake of fire that burns with sulfur. 21 And the rest were slain by the sword that came from the mouth of him who was sitting on the horse, and all the birds were gorged with their flesh.
That is some good news right there. It’s a little gross, a little gory, but at least it’s the bad guys getting gored in Revelation 19:21. So the Antichrist and the False Prophet, 2/3 of the Satanic trinity, get tossed into the Lake of Fire. But what about Satan himself, how does he escape this? Well the next three verses get to his fate.
Revelation 20:1-3
Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven, holding in his hand the key to the bottomless pit and a great chain. 2 And he seized the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years, 3 and threw him into the pit, and shut it and sealed it over him, so that he might not deceive the nations any longer, until the thousand years were ended. After that he must be released for a little while.
So during the millennial reign of Christ, Satan is bound in a bottomless pit for 1000 years. Now, you might think he got a pretty good deal here since you’d probably rather get dropped in a hole than get dropped into the Lake of Fire. At least the hole wouldn’t be so hot.
Except this isn’t the first time we’ve seen the bottomless pit in Revelation. It was already opened up once before in Revelation, chapter 9. This is during one of the judgments during the 7 year tribulation. There will be a five-month stretch of the tribulation where people on earth are tormented by these demonic flying scorpion creatures who swarm like locusts.
In Revelation 9:2-3, it says:
2 He opened the shaft of the bottomless pit, and from the shaft rose smoke like the smoke of a great furnace, and the sun and the air were darkened with the smoke from the shaft. 3 Then from the smoke came locusts on the earth, and they were given power like the power of scorpions of the earth.
These things were unleashed for five months. It said that God wouldn’t even let the people die during this time. They were just harassed by these things. They longed to die. But somehow, God prevents them from dying. Add this to the list of reasons that you wanna make sure you are right with the God and go in the rapture!
And so this is what’s waiting for Satan in that bottomless pit. He’ll be tormented not just for five months, but for a thousand years. Revelation 20 says the dragon is chained and sealed in there that whole time.
By the way, you will hear a lot of Christian denominations today have different views of the Millennium. Some are premillennial like me, some are postmillennial, some are amillenial. Some believe that we are in the millennium right now, that the millennial reign of Christ is not a literal thousand-year period, but that it’s an eternal reign of Christ in our hearts.
Now, here’s the biggest problem with believing that we’re in the millennium right now: according to Revelation 20, Satan is chained up and locked away during the Millennium. So if we’re in the Millennium right now, Satan must have a pretty long leash. That theory of the end times really doesn’t make sense with all of the New Testament’s warnings about Satan going about as a roaring lion. None of that matters if Satan was locked away when Peter wrote that. Satan masquerades as an angel of light according to Paul, but why would he warn us about that if Satan had been locked away?
So because that view makes no sense, I am premillennial: I believe that Jesus will come back- which is Revelation 19- and then Satan will be locked away- that’s Revelation 20- and it’ll happen in the order that Revelation says it will happen. What’s the first word of Revelation 20? It was “then.” Jesus returned in Revelation 19, THEN Satan is locked away in Revelation 20. Clear as day.
So I really have no time for these eschatologies that tell us that Satan is locked away now but that Jesus hasn’t returned yet. Jesus is coming, and THEN Satan is locked away for 1000 years. Neither of those things have happened yet. It’s at least 7 years away. And hopefully only 7 years away. Unless you come across this podcast during the tribulation. Which is pretty awesome to think about.
OK, so why is Satan just locked away for a thousand years? Why doesn’t God just throw him into the lake of fire with the false prophet and antichrist?
Well, God is going to give Satan one more chance to overthrow him. I mean, at this point, we’re just humoring Satan, right? Everything Satan has tried to do for thousands of years to mess up God’s plans didn’t work. That’s why I always laugh when I hear these Muslims threaten to wipe out all the Jews, wipe Israel off the face of the map. I’m like, someone much more powerful than you and much smarter than you has been trying to do that for literally thousands of years. If he can’t do it, I’m not sure why you expect to.
But anyway, Satan is released at the end of the Millennial Reign of Christ for one last rebellion. Anyone who has been living in Christ’s Kingdom is allowed to make a choice as to whether they’d like to continue along with Jesus or rebel and join the dark side.
Why is Satan a part of this? The same reason God has always allowed Satan to roam the earth: to give mankind a choice. Every person has a choice. Team God or Team Satan. And Team Satan always loses.
Revelation 20:7-10
7 And when the thousand years are ended, Satan will be released from his prison 8 and will come out to deceive the nations that are at the four corners of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them for battle; their number is like the sand of the sea. 9 And they marched up over the broad plain of the earth and surrounded the camp of the saints and the beloved city, but fire came down from heaven and consumed them, 10 and the devil who had deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and sulfur where the beast and the false prophet were, and they will be tormented day and night forever and ever.
Now, I don’t know how long this will take. I’m not sure how big of a battle it is. But interestingly, it’s not much of a fight. Fire comes out of heaven and consumes the entire army. God opens up the Lake of Fire. Antichrist is still there. False prophet is still there. 1000 years later, they’ve probably forgotten their own names, but they’re still there. And now Satan finally gets tossed in as well, anyone who rejected God goes with him, and the door is shut for all eternity.
Hell is eternal, ladies and gentlemen. Make sure you’ve made your reservation in heaven because this is the devil’s fate, and you don’t want to go where he’s going.
[musical interlude]
Housekeeping/Mailbag
Next time on this podcast, let’s return to the book of Ezekiel- where we still never finished chapter 28, despite spending all of January on it! We’ll wrap up Ezekiel 28 next time (probably). Make sure you’re subscribed so you can get it!
Email: crossreferencespodcast@gmail.com
Had a mailbag on a recent episode about Satan from Joe in North Carolina:
Good podcast. Note that the English word snake isn't found in the KJV, but another synonym of serpent is: dragon. But did snakes even exist before God cursed the serpent?
Always appreciate Joe’s positive comments. And I went ahead and responded and here is what I said: in my research, I learned that there is a Hebrew word for snake (which Genesis 3 did not use) as well as the Hebrew word nachash, which is translated there as serpent. Serpent basically means the same thing as snake, but also has a lot more semantic meaning packed into it.
I have a theory that snakes had arms and legs before the fall. Might sound a little silly to some, but evolutionary scientists actually believe that snakes used to have arms and legs after studying snake skeletons and fossils. I don't personally believe in evolution; I think those signs of arms and legs are there because snakes actually had them before God cursed the serpent.
I remember watching The Good Dinosaur with some of our foster kids, and it’s a movie set in prehistoric times, but there is a scene where a snake comes out, and it’s very clearly a snake, but it also has arms and legs. So I looked up why they included this scene, and the Pixar animators had researched how according to evolution, snakes had arms and legs at one point. so to stay true to science, the animators made the ancient snake in The Good Dinosaur have legs.
Isn’t it interesting that the science says the same thing the Bible says about ancient snakes. I’m sure it’s just a coincidence, guys. And I don’t believe in evolution. But I do believe in Genesis 3, where God cursed the serpent and said from now on you’ll crawl on your belly.
Closing Thoughts
As we close down, I want to mention one thing I always think of when I read Revelation 20. One time I was actually working on a Sunday School class for this chapter, so I believe this would have been in 2015, because I remember teaching through Revelation that year. And this is when I was working as a staff pastor at a church. And a woman stopped by the church that day, and she asked if she could go pray in the sanctuary. This was, like, on a Tuesday. And so we let her on in. I think the church secretary let her in, actually, and after a while the secretary brought her back to my office. I was talking to her about whether there was something going on in her life and if there was anything she needed, I was going to try to share the gospel with her, and over the course of this conversation it comes out that she is demon-possessed.
Now, I’ve heard demon-possessed people before, I’ve talked to them, I’ve heard absolutely inhuman voices come out of them. That did not happen in this story. She was very lucid. She explained to me when she let a demon enter her and why. She didn’t want any help. She didn’t want her demon to go. I tried to pray over her and cast it out but she didn’t want it to go. So I couldn’t really do anything for her.
I tried to explain to her that she would go to hell, and she told me that she believed God would forgive her and forgive the demons and even forgive Satan. So at that point, my Bible is sitting right there at Revelation 20, and I pick it up and begin reading those verses to her about what is going to happen to Satan someday. The same verses we just studied about 10 minutes ago.
Now, she jumped up off the seat when I said that. Up until then, she had been pretty calm. Very talkative, but calm. She seemed totally unphased by everything I had said to her. I was wondering if she actually was even demon-possessed or if she was just delusional. But once I started reading those verses about the fate of the devil in Revelation, she freaked out. She jumped up off her seat like it was on fire. She grabbed her ears and she yelled at the top of her voice, “Stop saying that!” Something totally different came over her.
And based on her reaction to that, that pretty well convinced me that there was a demon inside of her. Her reaction was so extreme to just hearing some Bible verses. And it goes to show just how powerful the Word of God is to the spiritual realm. As I said in the previous episode- which I believe was maybe the most important episode I’ve ever recorded, so if you didn’t hear it, please go back and listen. In the previous episode of the Cross References podcast, I talked about how the Word of God is our sword of the spirit, and the spiritual realm knows it is indestructible. I have seen firsthand how a demon reacts when their fate is described there.
So be careful who you align yourself with. Because if you’re on Satan’s team, his destiny is called the Lake of Fire. And not just him, but his angels, his demons, and every person who chooses to follow him instead of God. It is real. It’s not a fairy tale, even though it has a dragon.
And that might be something the fairy tales get right. Watch out, because there is a dragon out there. But there’s something else the fairy tales get right: dragons can be slain. And God’s Word tells us he will be.
The bad news is, it’s at least 1007 years away.
But I’m really really hopeful that it’s only 1007 years away.
Perhaps the year of the dragon will be the first of the dragon’s seven years. I hope you’re ready for it.
And by the way, if it’s not this year, the next year doesn’t look that much better. 2025 is the year of the serpent.
Thanks for listening to the Cross References Podcast. This has been Luke Taylor, and I hope the Bible makes more sense to you after this episode.