The Christmas Dragon - Episode 054

Carey Griffel: [00:00:00] Welcome to Genesis Marks the Spot, where we raid the ivory tower of biblical theology without ransacking our faith. My name Carey Griffel, and I wish you a Merry Christmas. Unless you're listening to this more than a few days after this episode comes out, in which case, still Merry Christmas, because it's not like we can't celebrate the birth of the Savior any day.

I know that I had a Christmas themed episode back in September when talking to Jeffrey Pitts about his book, An Advent for the Cosmos. We did that back in September to mark the potential actual birthday of Jesus of September 11th. But right now, we are in the middle of celebrating Christmas according to the Christian liturgical calendar.

Today, we're going to be talking about the Dragon of Christmas. The Christmas dragon is not a very cuddly [00:01:00] one, but we'll get into that in a bit. I have with me my good friend Mike Chu, who is a fellow administrator at the Divine Council Worldview Facebook group, as well as the academic director of the Awakening School of Theology.

This is a school that I have received a certificate in that helped me along my path to getting my master's, and the course offering they have at the school are so well curated. But I'll let him talk a bit more about that. Welcome, Mike. Please let us know a little bit about yourself and maybe some things about the school before we start talking about dragons.

Mike Chu: Thanks Carey for inviting me. So again, to your audience, my name is Mike Chu. You guys might recognize that name because I've been helping out with the Awakening School of Theology for more than a couple of years. This past April I had become the academic director. After Dr. Heiser, before his passing, he was asked by the president of the school Karla, if he had [00:02:00] any ideas or any suggestions for who could possibly take over his role as the academic director of the Awakening School of Theology.

He had a few names apparently, but he listed mine as the first choice if it was possible. I was, I was genuinely surprised. I had helped Dr. Heiser with a couple of the live QA sessions for the school. Especially after his cancer diagnosis was discovered. And so, over the years, I had been interacting with the students just in the live QA sessions.

And then found myself, before I even had graduated with my Master's of Divinity, to actually become an academic director, which is was kind of mind boggling and a huge responsibility, and it was also a great privilege. And so, I told Mike before his passing, that I was going to take over, that I accepted the position, and, yeah, it's been a journey for the last couple of months.

The school was founded by Dr. Heiser, I think about a [00:03:00] few years ago before the pandemic started, it originally had live classes and those classes were recorded so that they would then be available for students who wanted to take his Unseen Realm classes again, but, you know, it had a live, you know, studio audience, some could say, but after the pandemic, all of the classes essentially went into just pure digital online no more live in sessions.

And so that actually gave us a lot more flexibility on the availability of the classes when people can take classes and essentially it's seminary level content offered to lay persons who are interested in this kind of material, but who are not necessarily looking to get a seminary level degree. And so that's the advantage.

We recently in our own you know, meetings within the administration, we've been talking about, well, what is the price difference? And I basically told him, Hey, this is how much I've been paying for Gordon classes [00:04:00] when I was doing my MDiv. And it essentially is about one fourth the cost. And so. You know, for anyone who's interested in, you know, theology, in particular languages, in any particular subject, we have courses that are starting to flesh a lot of those things out.

And it's been a really great journey for the last couple months of just kind of helping us, one, create courses that would be interesting to students. And two, we've been on this kind of map that Dr. Heiser had laid out for us before his passing. He had always had a dream that Students of the Bible who want to have this kind of deep content, but who can't necessarily come and attend a European or Western style seminary, either because of finances or just really because of access, that they would have a chance to receive this kind of material.

And so for the last [00:05:00] several months, we've been working on this initiative where we're creating a 12 course certificate. That will eventually be offered for free to those who are in locations that are very inaccessible to this kind of material. tHose who are in, you know, the United States and other, you know, more affluent countries.

Of course, we would hope that they would also seek out to be able to purchase these courses, gain the knowledge from the content, but their purchases will actually help fund that initiative that we want to be able to assist, especially pastors who are in very remote areas that can't get away to be able to go to a proper, you know, educational kind of setting that they can actually receive this training on the ground and just take it at their leisure at their timing when, you know, their schedules are available.

And so that's what the school has been doing for the last couple of months. And yeah, it's been a really incredible journey just [00:06:00] being able to connect with new scholars who have been helping out with the school and just crafting kind of the road map for what the school is going to be doing in the next several years.

Carey Griffel: Do you guys have all of the courses laid out already for what's going to be included in that certificate?

Mike Chu: So we have nine that are either already published or they're in the pipeline and they're getting ready to be published. We have 12 courses that we're hoping to complete. We have people lined up for every one of them.

Now, the last two, we just need to be able to lock down the actual dates. So we're looking to probably a little bit past 2024. We do have that roadmap and. We're hopeful that we're actually going to get that done. I Guess also just to kind of give folks another little picture about who I am, because I, I did allude to that I was finishing up my time at seminary. I graduated in may with my masters of divinity at Gordon Conwell theological seminary in the Boston area. It was a five [00:07:00] year journey. A lot of that five year journey was because I took about a year and a half to get through Hebrew.

You know, you try to try to get as much as you can do in one semester, but once you hit a certain point, you either make a choice of either I'm going to be fine with getting a C, or I'm going to take extra time. So I actually can properly learn the material. And I went for the latter. And so, yeah, it took me five years, but I was so happy when I got it done.

And, yeah, it took me five years. And apparently I wasn't I wasn't finished with the, the hardship because I decided to also continue a doctor of ministry degree in preaching, uh, that started right in June. So I barely had like maybe two, three weeks of a break and then just started right into the doctor of ministry program and that's been really good too, because it's given me a chance to kind of dive [00:08:00] into a little bit of all the things I've loved about my seminary education, especially with the languages, especially with exegeting passages, and then I get to also communicate that to people in my church, which has been really an awesome privilege. So yeah one day it'll be really cool to actually learn all the ins and outs of preaching, but also still maintain this deep love of ancient Near East context, the divine council worldview, and finding and figuring out ways how to communicate that to the lay person in the pew who has never heard of Dr. Heiser or Daniel Block or Carmen Imes, but who are just wondering what the heck does this passage mean?.

Carey Griffel: Well, there's a massive disconnect, or at least there has been a massive disconnect between the Academy and the people sitting in church. That's getting less and less now, but there's still that desperate need for really good ability to communicate that.

Mike Chu: I [00:09:00] agree. And I think that's, it's kind of ironic in many ways, I think, because if it wasn't for the scholars, if it wasn't for those who actually really cared about the text, because they could read the text.

Ironically, we wouldn't have the text if it wasn't for these folks who actually cared and even sacrificed their own lives for parchments of paper because they really felt that this was actually meaningful and actually worthy and also valuable for the body of Christ. And I mean, like, for example, we only have two out of what we suspect four letters that Paul wrote to the Corinthian church. The other two have been lost. Just due to losing the, the, the original scrolls, the original manuscripts, or they just people forgot that they even have it. That's the kind of the sad thing, but the two that we do have has been just a treasure trove of theology and [00:10:00] of just insight into the early church.

And so it's really because of the scholar that in many ways our faith has been able to persevere after all these many years, because they were willing to give up their time and lives for this.

Carey Griffel: Yeah, it's very important to have all of these pieces in the body of Christ, I think. Exactly. And I love that you're doing the preaching side of things, because people tend to not realize how important it is to know how to do that effectively.

Mike Chu: Yeah, and I, you know, this is a little tease in the paper that I'm still trying to finish. I'm actually needing to submit this paper that's going to be part of my dissertation this Saturday. But one of the things that in my research I've come across is that The preacher, whether he or she knows it or not, that person is actually following in a heritage line of Old Testament prophets.

It's not to say that, you know, whatever comes off [00:11:00] the mouth of the preacher is also now like, you know, the canonical authorized word of God. It absolutely does not mean that. What they are doing is they're carrying on in the tradition of being a herald, of being a spokesperson for God. They're saying the words of God, they're revealing and proclaiming the things about God to the people of God, and to anyone who would listen.

And so, it's actually a really great responsibility. And it isn't something I've been realizing to be ever taken lightly. A person may have a lot of talent, they may be a great communicator, but at the same time, if they don't have the character or the maturity to handle that gifting, that gift can be used to rape the service to the church and even harmful, not just to the church but also to non Christians who are even hearing the message because they could hear something that That would be harmful to them, [00:12:00] harmful to those around them, and there is a heavy weight and responsibility to the words that come off of our lips.

Carey Griffel: Yeah. So the people taking the courses at the Awakening School will be able to help fund that kind of teaching for people who don't have access to it.

Mike Chu: Exactly. And I've been around preachers, and I even have done teaching, and I've, like, always loved preaching.

But one of the things that I've always kind of thought is funny is that preachers get very Modern preachers, at least here in the evangelical American context, we get so enamored with these, like, little short, you know, memes or short little catchphrases. And we think, like, this, this will blow people away, this will, like, show them so much theology.

And yet, when you really actually push them on, like, well, how far does your own theology go? It's still very It's very wide, but it's [00:13:00] essentially an inch thick of theology. Like, they barely know or could explain the gospel message or why Jesus, what was the meaning of the cross? Why was that such a big deal to the gospel writers, to the apostles?

They can only give essentially the same kind of answer that they probably learned in children's Sunday school. And that's, that's sad when you're thinking about this person is standing in front of hundreds, if not at times thousands of people. And proclaiming, yes, the good news, but when they are asked, well, how do I grow? How do I know God deeper? How do I actually read and study the scriptures? They can't give a proper answer. And that is not part of being a preacher isn't just proclaiming a message. It's also being a shepherd and a person that's caring and loving towards the whole body of Christ. And that includes Their minds, their souls, their [00:14:00] bodies, everything about them, because it's a great responsibility to be called to be a herald of God.

It's not something that should ever be taken lightly. .

Carey Griffel: I am so excited to see the things that are coming out from the school and from what you're doing just in your personal life, to see the growth and development of all these things that are going on in the body of Christ right now.

So, let's go ahead and switch gears to our topic about Christmas dragons.

We were talking about this passage in Revelation 12. I can't remember what month it was. It was a little while ago, but we were talking with the guys from the Two Trees, and you were talking about this passage, and it just really stuck in my head, like, everyone loves the Book of Revelation, and getting into the nitty gritty details, and trying to figure out all of these things.

But there's so much context to these passages and these things that are in the book that a lot of people are not catching because they're just not in that context. And so we have [00:15:00] this long tradition of misinterpretations, I might say, of the text. So I just wanted to kind of get into some of that and talk about what this passage means, especially in relation to the season we're celebrating right now.

And a lot of people, I think, don't realize that there is this connection.

Mike Chu: So I, this was a couple of years ago that , you know, I have to give dibs, right? That the first person I ever heard talk about this in a way that I never even, you know, contemplated was Dr. Heiser. He had pointed out that a lot of times our theology, especially about Satan and about the demons that follow him, a lot of it is really kind of more of a pop culture distillation of Milton's, you know, paradise loss.

We don't even realize it, that how much that particular, you know, epic, English epic affected the English world and even, ironically, our theology. It's essentially, it was his version of trying to create. A [00:16:00] grand Roman Greek like epic like the Aeneid or the Odyssey, but, you know, the English version. And so, a lot of times we get this concept of, for example, oh, Satan took a third of the angels with him when he rebelled.

A lot of that, we assume, came from Revelation 12. But the irony is I don't think many of us had ever actually read through Revelation 12 and realized, wait a minute, this doesn't make sense. How does this fit? And, and the reality is it doesn't fit. It actually is, , we were reading into the text because we were more obsessed with a number, especially the one third number.

And so the only place in the scripture where it mentions anything that could relate to celestial beings or spiritual beings, divine beings, however you want to call them and then the number one third. is in Revelation 12. And so, a few years ago, I had pitched to my pastors, why don't we do the atypical Christmas story?[00:17:00]

And so, we did, you know, sermons that were focused on not your typical kind of Christmas sermon, such as, you know, focusing on Simeon, or Ananias, or on Zachariah. Like, the kind of stories that usually one would not think of when they think of Christmas. Not the shepherds, not the magi, not the angels in, in, in, you know, on the fields of Plain.

But here, when it was my turn to do a sermon, I decided to do Revelation 12. Because Revelation 12 is actually, like you said, Carey, the Christmas dragon. The, Christmas dragon is all over this whole entire chapter. And so I, I guess, do you want to just read into the passage and then we'll go right through it?

Let's go ahead and do that. Okay. So , I'll be reading from Revelation 12 and I'm going to be using the NIV version 2010. Just so if folks are following along they'll hopefully be able to [00:18:00] figure out why the words might not match up with their translation. So, Revelation 12, starting in verse 1.

A great sign appeared in heaven. A woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and a crown of twelve stars on her head. She was pregnant and cried out in pain as she was about to give birth. Then another sign appeared in heaven. An enormous red dragon with seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns on its head.

It's tail swept a third of the stars out of the sky and flung them to the earth. The dragon stood in front of the woman who was about to give birth, so that it might devour her child the moment he was born. She gave birth to a son, a male child, who will rule all the nations with an iron scepter, and her child was snatched up to God and to his [00:19:00] throne.

The woman fled into the wilderness to a place prepared for her by God, where she must be taken care of for 1260 days. Then war broke out in heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought back. But he was not strong enough, and they lost their place in heaven.

The great dragon was hurled down, that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray. He was hurled to the earth, and his angels with him. Then I heard a loud voice in heaven say, Now have come the salvation and power in the kingdom of our God, and the authority of his Messiah.

For the accuser of our brothers and sisters, who accuses them before our God day and night, has been hurled down. They triumphed over him by the blood of the lamb, and by the word of their testimony they did not love their lives so much as to shrink [00:20:00] from death. Therefore rejoice, you heavens, and you who dwell in them, but woe to the earth and the sea, because the devil has gone down to you.

He is filled with fury, because he knows that his time is short. When the dragon saw that he had been hurled to the earth, he pursued the woman who had given birth to the male child. The woman was given the two wings of a great eagle so that she might fly to the place prepared for her in the wilderness, where she would be taken care of for a time, times and a half, out of the serpent's reach.

Then from his mouth, the serpent spewed water like a river to overtake the woman and sweep her away with the torment. But the earth helped the woman by opening its mouth and swallowing the river that the dragon had spewed out of his mouth. Then the dragon was enraged at the woman and went off to wage war against the rest of her offspring, those who keep God's commands and hold fast their testimony about Jesus.[00:21:00]

So as you can tell, and as you might guess, when I first preached this, and when we read the whole entire, like, chapter. Eyes were like wide open because people were absolutely like, why are we, why are we reading this chapter?

Carey Griffel: It's Christmas time. Didn't you know that?

Mike Chu: Yeah, it was funny. It was actually a few months ago, we were me and my lead pastor. We were talking about this sermon again. And he told me that most of the people who came up to him after that service, they loved it. But there was one guy, he remembered, who came up and said, This is Christmas time. This is supposed to make me happy. What is this? What was this sermon?

And so, He wasn't like angry or upset, but he was just completely baffled of like, why in the world are you guys preaching on stuff like this? And so, it was really funny. It was really funny to me. So, I [00:22:00] guess a few things, right, to, bring off the bat. The reason why we're calling this the Christmas Dragon is because the whole entire scene of this, this vision or the signs that John was seeing, it was happening during the birth of Jesus.

And, like, there are all these little clues and all these little allusions back to Old Testament scriptures that John throws in to make it very clear. We're talking about Jesus the Messiah. We're talking about the Christ. And so, if this is about Satan and how he got his one third section of angels, then this isn't it. Because this time frame is completely not connected to Genesis. And so that's the first thing that we have to acknowledge and admit that the text does not say this is happening in the past, this is happening during creation. No, the text is saying time wise, this is happening at the time of Jesus [00:23:00] birth.

Or, you know, now in the Doctor of Ministry program, I'm using a phrase now these days called the Christ event. To essentially, it's the, it's a way to summarize the birth. Life, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus all in one phrase. I learned this from one of the overseeing professors in the program that, ironically, the first ones to create that phrase were those who were convinced that Jesus never existed or that the Bible was not completely reliable.

And so they thought, we'll just create a phrase that describes, yes, you Christians call it the Christ event. But then, ironically, more and more Christian scholars have been using it because, like, you know, that's a great way to summarize. So I don't have to always say the, you know, the birth life. It's just, this is the Christ event.

And it's so apt for this passage because, essentially, we're seeing time being compressed. in a very [00:24:00] few words, the entire birth, life, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus is happening in a few words and that's the Christ event, the thing that the dragon is trying to prevent from happening.

Carey Griffel: and if he can stop it at any point in time, then he's stopped it, right? Whether it's the birth, whether it's the Ascension or whatever. So there's all of this royal imagery in the passage, the birth imagery. And yeah, I think that trying to force this into Genesis, or a time before Genesis even, the context, like, there's no words there, there's no phrases there that will hearken back to Genesis.

It just doesn't make any sense to connect it back to that time.

Mike Chu: Exactly. And I think this is, you know, where we have to be careful, right? Because so many times people will say, well, if there's the text, it says one third of the stars. But, you know, we could still be inserting our interpretation or [00:25:00] eisegeting the text while technically quoting the text.

And that's what often is happening here. So, I mean, I guess we'll start with one of the first things, right, that people notice in this chapter. John says there's this great sign in heaven. Now, I will definitely refer people to check out Heiser's courses at the Awakening School. He has a great section that talked about. That this probably actually was a real astronomical celestial event that people of John's time, Paul's time, they would actually still remember of like, wow, yeah, I remember looking up in the sky and they notice particular constellations were in certain places.

And so this is what, at least I know Dr. Heiser and several other scholars are thinking that this is actually related to. An actual astronomical event, but either case, even just from the text itself, it's so clever that John is also using other [00:26:00] allusions to the Old Testament to help people get the idea here in verse one he says a great sign in appears in heaven, a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet and a crown of 12 stars on her head. This is not Mary. This is describing someone that is associated with the sun, the moon, and the stars. And most prevalent understanding is that this is actually a reference to Israel.

Because in Genesis, Joseph had a dream. This is before he gets thrown down a well and left for dead by his brothers before they realize they can make some money off of him. That he had this dream that he saw his mom, his dad, and his brothers all bowing down before him, but they were symbolized and represented in his dream as the sun, moon, and stars.

[00:27:00] And, you know, there are some later on rabbinical interpretations that change it where it's not you know, Joseph's dad and Joseph's mom. It's sometimes seen as Abraham and Sarah, but the 12 stars are consistent that consistently they always thought those 12 stars represent the 12 tribes of Israel.

And so this suspicion is that the woman is not Mary's not talking about the human mother of Jesus. It's talking about Israel. Seen here as a woman, and I think it was Dr. Beale and Dr. Heiser had brought this up in his own kind of revelation commentary that this woman is a representation of the faithful community, those who've actually stayed allegiant to Yahweh.

And so this woman is appearing who represents Israel and what's going on with her. Verse two is that she's pregnant. And the crazy thing is in our English texts here in [00:28:00] NIV, it says simply, she cried out in pain. And, you know, many of us would not be surprised by that, even if we have never given birth, we have watched enough countless sitcoms to know that when women give birth to children, it is not a very easy ordeal.

But the crazy thing about the particular word in Greek that John is using here the word, essentially, when you look it up through the Greek lexicons that we have, and even just the word history, it's not just crying out in pain. It's crying out in pain because the person is being tortured. It is extreme pain, agony from being tortured. And so that's a very extreme use. To describe giving birth and the connection for me and from what I can understand, if the woman represents Israel, this is John's acknowledgement of [00:29:00] the pain and of the hardship that his people, the nation of Israel, the people of Israel have had to endure for centuries, if not millennia of the kind of Persecution, the kind of genocides that they have had to endure, this kind of disenfranchisement that they have experienced.

And so it's a kind of reminder to us that our savior, our King was born off of people who were disenfranchised, who were in agony, who were under oppression at that time by the Roman empire. and it is really interesting that John chooses to use that word instead of a typical word that would be used for giving birth.

He uses this to symbolize, to send a message to the listener. Do you get it? I'm not talking about an actual woman. I'm not talking about a singular woman. I'm not talking about Mary that I took under my wing and took care of her after Jesus passed away. [00:30:00] No, I'm talking about Mother Israel. I'm talking about the nation, what the Jews had gone through, those who stayed faithful to Yahweh, what we had to endure.

And it's just, it's just sets up the tone that you know, okay, you're in for a very crazy Christmas story because you're not just talking about the typical Bethlehem, Joseph is trying to find some room at the inn. We're talking about this woman is, her life is in danger and she has been experiencing torture and pain.

And, you know, now we get to verse three where the wonderful Christmas dragon appears, the red dragon with seven heads and ten horns, seven crowns. There's a lot of symbolism. We will just move on from that because there's a lot more that we can get into. But just know we have a giant monster, essentially, that's now appearing before the woman.

And my own personal suspicion, based on the fact that he's using Greek. He's speaking to people who are [00:31:00] familiar with Greco and Roman culture and their mythologies. My suspicion is this dragon is more like a sea monster, more like Hydra. So, like, Hydra has multiple heads. This would actually fit along in that kind of imagery.

In verse 4, it says, its tail, the dragon's tail, swept a third of the stars out of the sky and flung them to the earth. This is usually where we'll hear then, you know, the end times, fire brimstone preacher mention. This is when Satan took a third of the angels with him and they rebelled and everything went to chaos.

But again, the reminder is this is likely happening at the time of Jesus's birth. This is a Christmas story. And so it is not happening in Genesis. It's happening right at that point. And so what is this? What is the imagery that we're being presented? We have a monster beast that is coming for the woman's child.[00:32:00]

And its tail alone is strong enough to swipe out a third of the stars out of the sky. And what I had never realized until a couple of years ago is that this sweeping and this flunging them is essentially another way of saying it is the dragon's tail felled them. He took the third of the stars out. He potentially killed them, which is.

A concept that just blows my mind, because if they are staying consistent with the concept that stars are living creatures, that they are just another way of saying angels, for example, or other divine beings, how does a divine being die? How is it fel And I remember asking Dr. Heiser this in one of those live QA's for the school.

Just because I was just like, like, are you, are you certain, do you think this is actually what it means? And he simply pointed me to Daniel [00:33:00] 8 10. And he asked me, however, you read that passage, that verse, that will help interpret what you see in verse four. And so if Daniel 8 10 is referencing something of a divine being that's being killed, or at least being beaten down upon, then that already had set up a precedence that John is probably already using. He's probably alluding to that moment. And, you know, this is not something that's new to anyone. People have been very well aware of that John has been using The book of Daniel and the book of Ezekiel and probably a lot of other Old Testament allusions He's been one of those gospel writers and folks who actually knows his Old Testament So well that he's essentially mixed and remixed it in a way that is its own new thing but just familiar enough if you are a familiar reader with the Old Testament and so This is not[00:34:00] new He's bringing up a concept that is very foreign to us as modern readers And I have absolutely no idea what does that mean?

How does a divine being die? Because I don't have a language to understand that. I don't know how to comprehend that. All I know is that the text is saying that this dragon in verse 4 is so strong that his tail alone is able to take out a third of the stars. And so what hope is there for this child?

That's essentially what John is setting up by verse 5. You got a little baby child that's about to be born. This dragon is able to take out a third of the starry host. What do you think is going to happen to this child?

Carey Griffel: I have just a quick question here, though. In verse four and verse nine, where the dragon's thrown down, are those different terms?

Are those different Greek words?

Mike Chu: Let me just double check . , oh, they're actually both the same word.[00:35:00] Yeah, so that's, it's a very interesting thing. They were flung down to the earth.

And in verse 9, the dragon was hurled down, and he was bollowed down to the earth as well.

Carey Griffel: So, if he was cast down in verse 9, then what's going on in verse 4?

Mike Chu: Yeah. It is interesting. And that's what, what I mean is like, when Dr. Heiser mentioned to take a look at Daniel 8:10. think on that through.

Carey Griffel: Do you have that one pulled up to read right now?

Mike Chu: Yep. DAniel 8. 10 in the NIV, it says, It grew until it reached the hosts of heaven.

So he's talking about a particular horn on a, on a monsterous beast as well in Daniel. It grew until it reached the hosts of the heavens, and it threw some of the starry hosts down to the earth and trampled on them. So, let me see if I can see what the Hebrew here says. To [00:36:00] fall, to cause a collapse, to fell.

And so that's another way of looking at that word in Hebrew. So, it's interesting. Because you have this concept of the dragon's tail is able to take out a third of the stars. They're flung down to the earth. Now, even if one wanted to try to say, for example, Oh, well then this is maybe another way of saying that they rebelled.

And yet you'll notice they were flung down to the earth. It didn't say that they came back up with him. Instead, in verse nine, you got the dragon with angels already with him. And then all of them together were thrown down. So there's a little bit of a, you have to kind of do some gymnastics in order to say somehow those third that were knocked out by his tail came back up.

Carey Griffel: It seems to me also that there is a judgment factor here to this word as well.

Mike Chu: Yeah. So, that's why it's a little bit, it's ambiguous at [00:37:00] best. It was just a very interesting and kind of disturbing concept to have Daniel 810 connected. Because the term 810 about being flung down or being thrown down, and being trampled on. It was this concept of essentially being run over by horses.

Carey Griffel: Yeah, it's like battle imagery.

Mike Chu: Yeah. again, you know, we're modern people, you and I, Carey, haven't been on chariots and been thrown off of our horse or anything like that. I've only ever ridden one horse in my life, and even then, that was a scary moment because, like, I felt the rippling muscles underneath me, and it was just like, holy cow, this, this, this horse, if if I made it upset, could totally throw me out.

And, you know, like, That concept of being thrown down in battle and being run over by horses, I don't know. I know you could technically say you could survive that. You might be able to survive that. I don't know if you can really [00:38:00] walk away on your own power after that.

Carey Griffel: Yeah. Well, this idea that verse four is some, Oh, we'll just join you and we'll happily go on our way.

It doesn't seem to be the case at all as far as the context and the word usage in any of that.

Mike Chu: No, if anything, it almost seems to me that this, that what's going on with the stars is that the stars were in the way of the dragon who was trying to get to the child. And so, like, like, get out of my way. And so, like, the third of these stars, like, oh, shoot, they literally became shooting stars.

They could not actually get out of the way. And, and so it's, it's it's really communicating just the power of this beast, this foe is formidable and it should not be underestimated. And when we get to verse five, though, John then makes it very clear if people are wondering who is this child, who is this child is, is this mother [00:39:00] Israel verse five pretty much confirms it because he says here she gave birth to a son, a male child. who will rule all the nations with an iron scepter. in the NIV, the part of the reason why I used it in my sermon was because the translator actually decided to put quotes this time around the phrase, will rule all the nations with an iron scepter. Other translations don't. They don't do that. That's actually a quotation, a very close quotation of Psalm 2 from Greek. Which is a messianic psalm. It's talking about the heir of David, the descendant of King David, the Messiah. And so this is just like a big glaring bright neon sign from John. If you're still wondering who I'm talking about, who the mother is and who is this child, this is Jesus. I'm talking about the Messiah.

And so This is what was the [00:40:00] setup is that you have this dragon, this monster beast with so much strength that a third of the stars cannot withstand it and he's coming for the Messiah and it simply says in verse five, and this is what I meant about the Christ event being just summed up in a few verses because right after the quotation from Psalm two, it says, and her child was snatched up to God and to his throne.

The word snatched up is a big key to understanding what the heck is going on. It is harpizo. It is the word that is used in the New Testament to describe resurrection. And so, when John is using this, it's like making it clear this is an allusion to Jesus, I'm quoting Psalm 2, and then I'm using the word that we've already used many times, Paul especially, to describe resurrection.

And so, this is talking about the Christ's event, especially about his [00:41:00] ascension. When he ascended after his time with the disciples and went back up , to the heavens where he is now seated on a throne, this is what John is talking about. In verse five, the dragon's plan to destroy, to devour the Messiah was thwarted.

It, the child was snatched up to God and he is now ruling on that throne and so, Obviously, we can kind of guess the reaction of the dragon wasn't so great. Like, I go through all this trouble, knock out a third of the stars that were annoying me, I'm about to eat this child, and instead the child gets snatched up. Resurrected. I can't do anything about it. He's now safe. And his reaction in verse 7, I mean, it kind of makes sense. War breaks out in heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought back. The reference fails me right now, but , this [00:42:00] precedence, this idea of the dragon or satan or the devil coming up to heaven and basically just being there, it isn't meaning that he's the satan in Job chapter 1 and 2.

There is a concept within some Second Temple material where essentially, the devil comes up to the gates of heaven, standing outside the gates, and he's demanding justice, and I put that with quotes, because he finds it unjust that God would actually allow Old Testament folks like Moses, or Abraham, or whoever, to actually have an afterlife, or spend time, or still be with him and not In the underworld, in Sheol, in the grave, like they're somehow with him.

And he finds that that's unjust. You know, they have done wrongs. And they belong to me because I am the Lord of the dead. And Michael and, you know, the guardians at the gates, in a , [00:43:00] some of these stories, they would just simply say, you know, that's not for us to answer to you. He's, he's upset, you know, like, this is unjust, I'm trying to like, you know, bring justice here.

And the thought is, is that this is actually an allusion to that kind of thing. And the dragon being upset that he has been duped, not just duped, but that he actually played a part in the salvation of humanity. And so war breaks out. And this is where. In this verse, the concept from John is that finally, the dragon, the devil, he has no more an the audience. He can never even come up to the vicinity of heaven because he has been thoroughly kicked out. He's not allowed to even approach. And so, what I found interesting is that in just a few short verses earlier, in verse 4, we're told that the dragon by itself, was strong enough to take out a third of the stars.

And yet [00:44:00] by verse 7 through 9, the dragon and his angels are overpowered by Michael and his army and they're thrown out and thrown down to the earth. And I do find it interesting of like what changed. What in the world changed? And the thing that happened in between is the Christ event. And I, and I think this was part of the reason why, you know, several of us were doing that podcast that you had mentioned earlier, because we were talking about like, what, what did the, the resurrection of Jesus, , what did his life, what did it change in the cosmos in heaven and on earth?

And to me, this was one of those key moments of something about the Christ event, something about his resurrection, his ascension. It even changed the odds for Michael and the remaining angels with him. To be able to not [00:45:00] just only overcome the dragon, but to also throw the dragon out with his angels.

Which just boggles my mind. He has now backup. And even with the backup, he can't overpower this angelic host that's pushing him out of heaven and he'll never be able to come back. And so that, that's an amazing kind of hint that there's something so powerful about the Christ event. That's something that was Doom and gloom in verse four, all of a sudden became, it's like, get out of here. You have absolutely no place and you are no longer welcome to even approach or even to accuse anyone anymore. And that is a comfort for John's audience. That the devil does not have an audience with God anymore. The devil cannot slander even his people before God because of the Christ event. I think that's one of the things sometimes we forget when we read Revelation [00:46:00] is that this book was written to a people at the time who were going through immense persecution.

They were being asked to bend the knee to Caesar, not just as their emperor, but as a god. And it was one of those terrible things that the Roman officials would do is that they would have A statue, a bust of one of the Caesars, and they would have these people who are suspected of sedition, usually they were Christian, and they would be asked, bow down, kiss, offer prayers to this statue, to the statue of Caesar.

And if you were a faithful and allegiant Christian, you would not do that. And to the Empire, you may have been paying your taxes, you may have been a good citizen, you may have been a really great neighbor, but in their eyes, full devotion to the Empire was absolute. No one can rival Caesar. And often a lot of the [00:47:00] Christians who did not bow died.

And that was the scenario that was going on and here, John is sending a message through this vision that he saw that even as monstrous and terrible as this dragon is the Christ event can overpower even this hideous monster. How can that not encourage us when we face those hard moments when we have to decide, will we stay allegiant to the Christ, to the son that was born with an iron scepter in his hand?

Or will we bow down in fear of this monster that is before us?

I mean, we can go on, but essentially the rest of this chapter is essentially about the defeat and the pending doom of the dragon, of this devil. And, of course, because he knows his time is short, because God said it so, and whenever God says something, [00:48:00] he knows it's going to happen. He knows his time is short. And so he goes about doing whatever he can to thwart or to delay or to hurt. , the faithful community that essentially Jesus was birthed out from, Jesus gave his life for, and Jesus gave rebirth to this faithful community who are allegient to him and to his father.

Carey Griffel: So even though he couldn't get that Christ child, he couldn't devour the child. He can at least harm the body of Christ who comes after him in some form, or at least he's trying to do so. That's his new goal.

Mike Chu: Yeah. I think this is a reminder to us, right? Because John is writing to a people, especially the seven churches, when we look at that region, they were a particular region during the time of Domitian, the emperor of that time. They were experiencing regional wide persecution. I personally believe that the reason why , [00:49:00] the letter of revelation was written specifically to those seven churches was because they were the major hotspots of one, Caesar emperor worship, and two, it was just so common to have people worship so many different pagan gods, including Caesar. That to be A Christian to be a person that gave allegiance to a man who was crucified on a Roman instrument of death and for people to glory in it, to bask in that was insanity for the people.

Carey Griffel: Oh, that would be so insulting to the Romans.

Mike Chu: It would be. I mean, the whole point of crucifixion was to essentially wipe the person from existence in the minds of anyone who knew him.

If you knew someone that was crucified, if they were a friend or a family member, the moment after they died from that crucifixion, you would never talk about them ever again. They would essentially be the one who must not be [00:50:00] named. In your own family, amongst your own friends, you essentially would have no longer existed in their memories. Because of how shameful and how demeaning the whole entire Act was. and this is part of the context of whenever I read that part of the passion story and when the thief on the cross asks Jesus, when you come into your kingdom, please remember me. There's a bit of sadness and tragedy when I read it because I know from the context, his own family and friends will never talk about him because of how humiliating a death on a cross was.

And so for Jesus to say, Hey, I'm not only just going to remember you, you're going to be with me, that was something well beyond whatever he probably could have ever imagined would have happened. And it is, again, it's a testimony of just the difference between the power of the dragon and yet the more supreme power of [00:51:00] Jesus the Christ.

I love Revelation 12. I probably actually may be touching upon it again for my church for another Christmas sermon. I'm trying to figure out how I can work that in because I do think there's something else going on in Luke 2. But, you know, I have to actually do my actual research before I even attempt something like that properly.

Yeah, this has been one of my favorite passages, and it's one of those things that reminds me and encourages me that whenever we suffer and go through hardship, it isn't an abnormal thing. We will experience it. And the Christians of the first century and second century, they knew it so well.

And in many ways, we as a modern church and modern people really need to look at our family history and learn this because This is who we are, and this is the heritage that we come from, and Jesus is saying to his bride, especially the seven churches in that region, when they're wondering, does God even know what's happening to us? Does he [00:52:00] know that we're dying here? Does he know that we're being financially disenfranchised here? Does he know that our families are being torn apart? And Jesus's response throughout the entire letter of Revelation is, I see you. I hear you. I know what's going on. I have partnered with you. I feel your pain because I have gone through a similar type of pain, but we will overcome because of what I had done. And so revelation 12 to me, it's a beautiful passage , of a little celestial baby child. And yet somehow. It's stronger than an enormous monstrosity of a red dragon

Carey Griffel: and through his birth, then that empowers the people who are loyal to him in order to also defeat the dragon.

Like not ultimately, but Michael and his angels were able to cast the dragon out. And so now that the dragon has focused on humanity and the offspring there, it [00:53:00] says in the end of the chapter, I think in my version, now, the dragon is focused on us, but we don't need to fear it.

Mike Chu: And I think we also have to note, how do they fight the dragon? Verse 17. This is not about, you know, voting for a particular politician. This is not about, you know, banning or, you know, some Guy dressed in a purple suit or something like that was years ago, I remember from like there was a particular ban of just like, you know, we, we have to have our children not watch this children's show anymore.

It's not that verse 17. The dragon was enraged, went to war against the rest of her offspring. Those who keeps God's command and hold fast their testimony about Jesus. That is actually how we ultimately resist and fight the dragon. It isn't us who's going to destroy the dragon. Our whole point in this time, in this intermediate of the already and not yet, our [00:54:00] responsibility is to hold fast to our testimony.

Our responsibility is to proclaim and herald the good news of the Christ King. Our job is to hold onto our testimony about Jesus. That means telling people about Jesus. That means being not ashamed that we follow after a child that held an iron scepter in his hand. It's about a child that came from a people who were abused and disenfranchised and even under threat of persecution and genocide.

This is about a child. Who ultimately changed the world through his life and his demonstration of love and sacrifice. It is our testimony that is ultimately what we use as a fight against the dragon, not weapons of war, not nuclear weapons, not political opponents or political strategies. It ultimately is the testimony, the character of the people of God.[00:55:00]

It cannot be anything less because we reflect our King. He did not have to do much to overpower this dragon. That's the same for us. We are asked to simply hold on to our testimony, and that is how we hold the line.

Carey Griffel: Amen. That is a powerful Christmas message. I have to say, it's like, this wraps up everything about why we're so excited about Christmas. ,

Mike Chu: it's one of the things for me, your audience may not be aware of, but You know, I had also lost my sister this past February and she was also a faithful Christian in many ways. She was part of that whole journey for me and how I became a Christian.

And one of the things about her that was very consistent from everyone who knew her and who would speak about her was how she always told people about who Jesus was. Her co workers at her secular job, people in her Bible study [00:56:00] fellowship, everyone always knew that my sister was always about who Jesus was.

And that was a wonderful way of just acknowledging that the way to sum her life up was that it was no doubt in anyone's mind that she loved Christ. And that for me as her brother, you know. Physically, as her brother, but also as a brother in the faith. For me, Revelation 12 is a reminder of that. It is a reminder as well, that God actually knows about our hardship and pain and suffering.

Christmas to me is not just a cute story of, you know, this little family that, you know, is like kind of going through the cold, dark night and giving birth in a stall. Ultimately, it is the demonstration that God is aware of the predicament and of the mess situation that we as humans have found ourselves in.

The daily pain that we experience in and out. And [00:57:00] Christmas is essentially Him saying, I am aware of what is happening. And for the people of God here on this world, it is a reminder that He is aware of what's happening. And our job is to hold the line by our testimony about Jesus. And let's be reminded, who is our Jesus?

Who is he? Is he like Caesar? No. Is he like our political leaders right now? Absolutely not. He is what humanity ought to have been, what humanity should be, and what one day we will become. That is a beautiful story and something that I think if we can return back to this more than just once a year, a lot of times our anxiety and our worries, especially as Christians, I think in light of who Jesus is, it would actually stem a lot of that [00:58:00] reactionary spirit that comes out of us because sure, the dragon was able to take out a third of the stars.

But after the Christ event, this dragon has no more power. Not against the angels, and not ultimately against the humans who are allegiant to Christ the King.

Carey Griffel: . Beautifully said. Well, thank you so much, Mike, for coming and talking about this and sharing all of that.

Mike Chu: Could I make a recommendation for people if people are interested, if they're not ready to dive full in into all of Revelation, but they want to have at least something that helps them start processing, like, what is the context? Who are the people that John was writing to? I Would recommend this book from our friend Matthew Halstead.

It just recently came out. It is called the end of the world as you know it. And if you were a kid in the nineties or knew about REM music, this may bring up a particular song, but I actually read this all yesterday because [00:59:00] I was getting ready. I was trying to like, make sure I could remind myself and refresh myself.

And this, I said to my wife this morning, you know, Dr. Heiser had a couple of resources every so often that he would say, all right. Old Testaments and the Relationship to the Law, go read this book. I agree mostly with it. You know, like, just please check it out. Stop asking me the questions. Sometimes we do that.

If Mike was still around, and Matt and Mike were good friends. He had Dr. Halstead on his podcast several times. I have a suspicion that if Mike was still actually alive now, he probably would be directing people, like, if you have questions about the context of Revelation, is it this? Is the rapture gonna happen? Is it pre millennial? What's the tribulation? All these kind of questions. What the heck is going on in Revelation 12? Matt here mentions it. I would recommend this book. This is a quick read. It's definitely at the level that laypersons can [01:00:00] understand. , I would highly recommend it. I really enjoyed this book and it made me laugh several times as I was reading it too, which helps.

And so, definitely I would recommend to the audience. If you haven't heard of Dr. Matt Halsted, you should totally check his material out because he is a great scholar, a friend of Dr. Heiser's, and I cannot recommend this book in particular anymore, like it's just, it's just so good. It's going to be my go to resource for people if they're wondering about revelation.

Carey Griffel: Perfect. That's awesome. I will definitely be linking that book in the show notes just so that it's really accessible to people. And is there anything else you'd like to say about the upcoming courses in the Awakening School of Theology or the current ones you're particularly excited about or ones that have just come out?

Mike Chu: So we just recently released Dr. Joel Matamale's course on the Doctrine of the Holy Spirit, and this is also part of that 12 course certificate that we are building out. Dr. [01:01:00] Matamale is actually, I think he was the last, mentee student, like he was able to have Dr. Heiser as one of his overseeing professors for his Ph. D. degree. And so, one, I'm a little envious, but if anything, like I've gotten to talk with Joel several times. I've been able to interact with him as we prepared for this release of the course and was able to go through his materials. I would highly recommend if people have questions about who the Holy Spirit is, is the Holy Spirit a he or an it, for example, why do we say that like that kind of thing?

Like this is a great course to check out because he doesn't just give you the theology. He really actually dies right back into the scriptures itself and points back to where the scriptures are saying this. And so this is really great of a course for people who are interested in understanding the person and the work and the power of the Holy Spirit.

We have also [01:02:00] just announced today that we're going to be releasing a new course from Dr. Ronn Johnson. One of Mike's best friends back during their doctorate level days, he helped us with a course on the Old Testament introduction. And so he's going to be going through essentially an overview of, , almost every book in the Old Testament.

I mean, there's. You know, there's a lot of books, and so he's not going to go through like, you know, here's what Joel says exactly, and here's what Jonah, but he will give the grander story and outline and themes that are going on throughout the Old Testament, and it's a very important thing because a lot of these themes and a lot of these ideas do trickle their way into the New Testament, and so folks who have been maybe intimidated by reading any of the Old Testament If they're just looking for some aid or for help, I would highly recommend that course too, because Dr. Johnson's coming at it , from a divine counsel worldview, he's coming with the assumption that the [01:03:00] supernatural is real. He's coming with the assumption that there is an assembly of divine beings or the gods. And I know that might scare some people when they hear the word gods, but just really drawing from the ancient Near Eastern context of where the Bible was written. It was written amongst the people who were so used to this idea of we're gonna have a committee. We have one big honcho, but we have a committee. And this big honcho is asking folks for their opinion. He wants their participation. He wants their ideas. And ultimately, whatever they and he decide together, we're going to do that.

And like, to me, that's not a terrible thing. That's actually a beautiful image of like, our God is a participatory, you know, cooperative, partnering God. He isn't just an emperor who says, now get me some grapes. Like, he actually wants participation. He wants people to actually be involved in what he is doing.[01:04:00]

And to not just be involved and not just know about it, but that they actually can participate in it. And that's just awesome. And so that's essentially to me, like, the beauty of a divine council worldview is that our God is ultimately the Supreme God. But He is a God that welcomes His creation to participate in everything that He is doing.

We are not passive, you know, stand buyers in Gillette stadium, rooting for the Patriots as they try to win a Super Bowl, which is not absolutely not going to happen this year. Unfortunately, it does not. But, you know, that that's just how it is. Like, we are not passive watchers. We are actually part of the story.

Carey Griffel: That's beautiful. All right. Well, thank you. In the show notes, I will be linking Dr Halstead's book. I will be linking the Awakening School of Theology So people can check that out if they're interested, and thank you so much for coming on, Mike.

Mike Chu: Thank you, Carey. Thanks for inviting me. And [01:05:00] just so happy to be on here. We've talked about you starting this podcast before a while ago, and it's great to just see how interested people have been in this content. Yeah, it was an honor when you asked me.

Carey Griffel: That is it for this episode.

And I want to thank you all for listening. I hope you all have a blessed Christmas or whatever season you find yourself listening to this in.

Just a quick reminder that you can go onto my website and you can find all of the cool links there for guests, like Mike Chu, there's a guest page and all of the guests are linked in the show notes of each episode page as well. So that's another great place to go to for resources, and I also do have my store tab up on my website where I'm selling my artwork to help support my podcast.

Right now I've got a bunch of original artwork up so go check that out if you're interested.

Thank you to my Patreon and PayPal supporters, you guys have really blessed my life, and are continuing [01:06:00] to bless my life, and thanks to those of you who share my episodes, who participate in discussions, who ask me questions for the Q& As and all of these other things. Really appreciate you guys.

If anyone wants to contact me, you can do so through my website at GenesisMarksTheSpot. com. I wish you all a blessed week, and we will see you later.