Winners

fff

Revelation 11:1–13 ESV

1 Then I was given a measuring rod like a staff, and I was told, “Rise and measure the temple of God and the altar and those who worship there, 2 but do not measure the court outside the temple; leave that out, for it is given over to the nations, and they will trample the holy city for forty-two months. 3 And I will grant authority to my two witnesses, and they will prophesy for 1,260 days, clothed in sackcloth.” 4 These are the two olive trees and the two lampstands that stand before the Lord of the earth. 5 And if anyone would harm them, fire pours from their mouth and consumes their foes. If anyone would harm them, this is how he is doomed to be killed. 6 They have the power to shut the sky, that no rain may fall during the days of their prophesying, and they have power over the waters to turn them into blood and to strike the earth with every kind of plague, as often as they desire. 7 And when they have finished their testimony, the beast that rises from the bottomless pit will make war on them and conquer them and kill them, 8 and their dead bodies will lie in the street of the great city that symbolically is called Sodom and Egypt, where their Lord was crucified. 9 For three and a half days some from the peoples and tribes and languages and nations will gaze at their dead bodies and refuse to let them be placed in a tomb, 10 and those who dwell on the earth will rejoice over them and make merry and exchange presents, because these two prophets had been a torment to those who dwell on the earth. 11 But after the three and a half days a breath of life from God entered them, and they stood up on their feet, and great fear fell on those who saw them. 12 Then they heard a loud voice from heaven saying to them, “Come up here!” And they went up to heaven in a cloud, and their enemies watched them. 13 And at that hour there was a great earthquake, and a tenth of the city fell. Seven thousand people were killed in the earthquake, and the rest were terrified and gave glory to the God of heaven.

Triumph of the Lamb: A Commentary on Revelation Revelation 11:1–2

In the two scenes of Revelation 11 John is first given a measuring rod and commanded to measure the temple (11:1–2); then he hears a heavenly voice narrating the prophetic career, assassination, and resurrection of those whom the voice calls “my two witnesses” (11:3–13). This section corresponds to the visions of the 144,000 and the international multitude of Revelation 7 in its placement (between the sixth and seventh of a series), theme (protection of the church amid suffering), and twofold structure. The visions of Revelation 11, however, nuance their portrait of God’s protective care with greater complexity. The measuring of the sanctuary (11:1) and the invincibility of the two witnesses until their testifying task is done (11:5) reaffirm the promise of Revelation 7: God will let nothing separate his people from his love. However, the prohibition against measuring the outer court, leaving it vulnerable to trampling by the Gentiles (11:2), and the beast’s slaughter of the witnesses (11:7) show that God promises not to spare us from all suffering but to secure our faith fast amid suffering.

John sees the perfections

The Temple include the people

Triumph of the Lamb: A Commentary on Revelation Revelation 11:1–2

The New Testament redefinition of the sanctuary of God as the people of God, expounded by Paul (1 Cor. 3:16–17; Eph. 2:20–22) and Peter (1 Peter 2:4–10; 4:14–17), has already been glimpsed in Revelation. That glimpse occurred in the promise: “He who overcomes, I will make him a pillar in the temple of My God, and he will not go out from it anymore; and I will write upon him the name of My God, and the name of the city of My God, the new Jerusalem, which comes down out of heaven from My God, and My new name” (Rev. 3:12). The identification becomes more explicit when we are told that the beast will blaspheme God’s “name and His tabernacle, that is, those who dwell in heaven” (13:6).

1 Corinthians 3:16–17 ESV

16 Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you? 17 If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy him. For God’s temple is holy, and you are that temple.

1 Peter 4:14–17 ESV

14 If you are insulted for the name of Christ, you are blessed, because the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you. 15 But let none of you suffer as a murderer or a thief or an evildoer or as a meddler. 16 Yet if anyone suffers as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God in that name. 17 For it is time for judgment to begin at the household of God; and if it begins with us, what will be the outcome for those who do not obey the gospel of God?

Revelation 3:13 ESV

13 He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.’

Revelation 13:6 ESV

6 It opened its mouth to utter blasphemies against God, blaspheming his name and his dwelling, that is, those who dwell in heaven.

d

Triumph of the Lamb: A Commentary on Revelation Revelation 11:1–2

The other view contends that the unmeasured outer court and the “holy city” that it represents, trampled under Gentile feet for fortytwo months, provide a contrasting perspective on the same true church that is pictured in the measured sanctuary. In the paradoxical way in which Revelation’s visions so often describe the church, Christ’s holy temple-city is secure and vulnerable: secured from apostasy and divine wrath by the power and grace of the Lamb but vulnerable to attack through persecution by the world’s noncovenant peoples. Although elsewhere in the Bible the title “the holy city” refers to the physical metropolis that was the capital of Israel and center of Jewish worship, in the Book of Revelation “the holy city” is the new Jerusalem, the bride of the Lamb (Rev. 21:2; 22:19)