When we look at the Sun-clad woman, in Chapter 12 of Revelation, as the Church things are consistent. It is a look into the future exclusively. John calls it a wonder. It is all new to him. The chapter does what the rest of the topical chapters (CHS 12-22) do; provides us with further detail and information about the outline. We are given profoundly new insights into the prophecies of Revelation. It is all in the future. There is no jumping and leaping back and forth between the beginning of the age and the end of the age.

The first five verses are easy to interpret. They almost interpret themselves. The woman is clothed in Jesus. Darkness and night are vanquished, under her feet. She is a child of the day. She is crowned with a crown of leadership as symbolized by the twelve stars. Jesus appears in this chapter not as the man-child but as the covering (the sun) for the Church. The Devil appears in his final form with the seven kingdoms of history and the ten kings of the Antichrist Kingdom as his glory. The rapture happens and the Devil is foiled in his attempt to stop or disrupt it. The stage is set for a Tribulation battle in heaven.

More new information is now added to the outline of chapters 4-11. Verse six shows that after the Rapture the Church is protected for three and a half years (the first half of the Tribulation). Souls are won and sinners are saved. God is feeding the Church like never before. We also find out in verses 7-11 that at the time of the Rapture a great battle takes place. The saints beat back the Devil and his army of angels and they cast out that Old Serpent from heaven. God has reserved the moment of victory in heaven for His Son’s great army of believers. The angelic creatures, along with Michael the archangel, are part of this victory but the real battle is fought by the glorified and resurrected saints.

We discover that while heaven is freed of the stench of Satan’s rebellion, the earth will still suffer from his anger and wrath. He is desperate now because he knows it is almost over for him. Verse eleven tells us who the champions of the hour are when we are told that, “they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony, and they loved not their lives unto the death”. That has to be The Church.

Chapter twelve ends by telling us the results of this war in heaven. We are told there will be two supernatural events that will help the Church for the first half of the Tribulation. She will be flown by the wings of an eagle (what that is we do not know) to a safe-haven (where that is we cannot tell for sure). We are told also that the Devil will try to destroy her by a flood but the earth will swallow it up (chapter 12). This protection will take place in the first half, we are told. But the Devil will not be deterred and he will come after her and the remnant of her seed during the Tribulation until he succeeds in overwhelming her, and we know from the first part of Revelation that the Antichrist, Satan’s man, will have the power to kill the saints during the second half of the Tribulation.

This interpretation makes good sense and it fulfills a requirement of the later chapters and adds new knowledge to Revelation’s outline.

This is Christ’s Wife
Jesus is Revelation’s central character. The great teacher of Revelation, Dr. Joseph Seiss, entitled his classic series of lectures in the 1850s on the book of Revelation, The Apocalypse, the Greek word meaning “the revealing”. Revelation is really the revealing of Jesus Christ in His glorified state in heaven. In Revelation, we see His true, full identity and character. An aspect of Christ’s “revealing” to us is the revelation of the Church. The New Testament teaches that the Church is a part of Christ, that they are to be one. She is meant to reflect His light. She is meant to put on His righteousness. He is the Head; she is the body. She is the virgin espoused to one husband; her husband is Jesus Christ. Her fidelity is her greatest virtue; rejection of all idolatry is paramount. In chapters 17 and 18 their meaning and implications are revealed. Because Christ is the Head and the Church the Body, it is reasonable to conclude that the Church is the second most important character in the book of Revelation and plays the second biggest role in the drama of restoration of the earth. She is Christ’s wife. Who or what could be more important in a book that reveals Christ’s true being. Christ cannot be revealed in His fullness without revealing His wife, the Church. For, “…Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it; that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word, that he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish.” Eph. 5.25-27. The Church and Christ are to be married. It is God’s plan that marriage should make two into one. “For we are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones. For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall be joined unto his wife, and they two shall be one flesh. This is a great mystery: but I speak concerning Christ and the church.” Eph. 5.30-32. Revelation is the finale. It is the last word on revealing Jesus in God’s Holy Word. His marriage to His bride is consummated and they become one. Is it any wonder that the topical chapters would begin by revealing more intimate details about Christ’s body and His wife?

Woman Second Most Important Character
Without question, the central character of Revelation is Jesus. He appears in every chapter and in a variety of roles, all in keeping with His character as Redeemer and Savior of mankind. He is the one who holds the church angels and leaders in the palm of His hand and decides whether a Church is in good standing or not. He is the Lamb that was slain. He is the only one worthy to take possession of the sealed title deed of the earth and open it. He initiates every judgment. He is the mighty angel that hands the deed of the earth over to the Church, the rightful heirs to the purchased possession. He appears as the reaper. He returns as the King of kings and Lord of lords.

The second most central character, without dispute, is the Church. Chapters one through three are devoted exclusively to the Church. In all of the chapters that follow she is actively involved or represented. It makes sense that God would begin the section of topical chapters by revealing more intimate truths about His Son’s separated ones (The Church). If this reference to the woman were strictly referring to the Jews then this would be the only chapter where the Church does not have some kind of representation either in action or by being acted upon. When Israel appears in Revelation it is mentioned by name, but the Church’s role, like that of Jesus, is much more diversified and complex. She has a number of sub-groups who take part in various aspects of Tribulation affairs; the rapture, the persecutions, marriage supper of the Lamb, preaching the gospel, and performing various ministerial and priestly tasks. There are different companies of believers with different functions, stations and rewards, as indicated in Psalm 45. For example, the 24 elders who are redeemed from every kindred, tongue, nation, and peoples, and are in heaven before the first seal is even broken, are not only leaders of faith and the Church they are among the raptured members of the Church. We are told that those who are resurrected from under the altar and receive white robes and palm branches are saints who come out of the Great Tribulation. We find in this chapter that the saints make war with Satan in heaven. And we shall find later on that the saints preach the gospel to the whole world from heaven during the second half of the Tribulation. Her duties are many and varied. Her rewards are given to sub-groups according to the obedience and faithfulness with which they discharged their duties.

Final Battle Of War Started In Eden
When Chapter twelve opens we immediately see that the characters are locked in mortal combat. The Dragon positions himself to devour the man-child at the moment of its birth and then sets out to harass, persecute and kill the woman. The battle is arrayed on two fronts: heaven and earth. We are viewing the last campaign of the Dragon’s age-old war against the woman and her seed. This is the woman and the Dragon: The Final Confrontation. Chapter twelve is the conclusion of the oldest, most heated battle of the human race. It is the battle between the Devil and the woman and her seed. Does it not seem fitting that the final campaign to win the war against Satan would be fought by the Church, the called-out ones, the ones separated by the blood of Christ and given the sword of the Spirit through faith in the Son of God? This then is the sun-clothed woman. Consider first of all that the battle began in the Garden of Eden when the Serpent instigated and beguiled the woman into eating from the forbidden tree of knowledge. When the man followed along and disobeyed, eating the fruit, the battle lines were drawn. Because of Adam and Eve’s disobedience and lack of trust in God, their seed also became corrupted and perverted. Mankind had gained a practical, working knowledge of evil. Now they could see. Now they could choose to do anything their mind and heart could conceive. The result was instant sin. The effect was to cause the two of them to hide from God because of guilt and shame. The price they paid for their sin was death. The battle to redeem them from the clutches of the Dragon, that old Serpent, Satan, was on. God moved immediately to give them hope and restore their life to Him. But it would be a long war. First, he established the rules. He pronounced judgment on the man and the woman, one would labor and never know security and peace, the other would travail to bring forth a seed that would someday redeem their situation and restore their standing with God. Both were condemned to a life of hardship and then death. Because they had not trusted Him they were now required to believe the impossible, that He would raise them from the grave to eternal life with Him. God also pronounced judgment on the Devil, prophesying of his defeat through the seed (the man-child) of the woman. God foretold of the raging battle that would ensue. There would be an ongoing struggle between the woman and the Devil. “And I will put enmity between thee and the woman”, God told the Devil. He also said He would put enmity between the Devil’s seed and her seed. Gradually through the law and the prophets, it was revealed that this great battle would finally be resolved only after the man-child defeated the Devil. The seed would suffer injury (the cross) but the Devil’s power would be destroyed and He would go into oblivion.

“And the LORD God said unto the serpent, Because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above all cattle, and above every beast of the field; upon thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life:
    And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.
    Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.
    And unto Adam he said, Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, of which I commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat of it: cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life;
    Thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herb of the field;
    In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.” Gen. 3.14-19

This is the last battle of the long war between the woman, the Devil and the seed of the woman. Does it not make sense that the final combatant would be the Church – the Bride which God has prepared for His Son?

Who is The Man-child?

“And she being with child cried, travailing in birth, and pained to be delivered.” Rev.12.2
“And she brought forth a man child, who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron: and her child was caught up unto God, and to his throne.” Rev.12.5

We must also bring chapter twelve into context with the rest of Revelation and the chronology of events in which we have already been schooled. Does it make good sense that God would begin to give us a history lesson about Christ’s birth as a Jew and His deliverance from Satan at this point in Revelation? (Jesus always appears in a glorified powerful way in Revelation, in the way He really is now.) Does it make sense that God would depict the Savior in a way that has been already revealed in the Gospels and revealed throughout the epistles of the New Testament? Revelation is about the appearance of Jesus and its consequences, good and bad, for the whole earth and its inhabitants. No, this imagery must be about the birth of the saints into eternity and life. It must be about the Rapture. The Roman Catholic and Episcopalian Churches for centuries have tried to sell believers on the proposition that Revelation is all historical, except for the final three chapters which record the return of Jesus and the thousand-year rule of the Millennium – a notion that is always implied to be some time off in a distant eon to come. But if we believe that, then we must discard all of prophecy. Jesus’ words are then vague and obscure, ultimately meaningless. Daniel is hardly even interesting reading if it is only history. But Jesus (around the year 90 AD, when Revelation was penned) makes it clear that Revelation concerns the end of the age. With this firmly fixed in our mind, let’s take a discerning look at the symbols.

The chronological chapters begin with John being caught up to heaven in an acting out of the Rapture. God begins the topical chapters with a picture of the Rapture as well. He does this in order to give us further insight into this crucial event in the overall plan to redeem man. God has already spoken at length about the death, resurrection and ascension of Christ in the Gospels, Acts and Epistles. In Revelation, He is revealing the secrets of the Rapture. At the summation of our study, we will find no less than seven references to the Rapture in seven separate chapters. Each one reveals more detail and insight into this glorious and long-anticipated event. The Rapture is the great hope of the Church and was always supposed to be. It is the reward held out to all saints that strive for perfection of obedience in Christ. At the time of the Tribulation, the Rapture is history. Revelation not only tells us about the qualities inherent in those who “are counted in that number” it also shows us some of its effects and fruits. We cannot see how the man-child being “caught up” is anything short of a picture of the Rapture. What follows the appearance of the woman and the birth of the man-child only supports our conclusion that this is just another perspective about the Rapture.

The time frame of three and a half years mentioned in the chapter cannot be construed as historical, for this is the time span used so consistently to refer to the Tribulation. It is only reasonable that we continue to expect this is the time frame to which chapter twelve refers. Later in the chapter we are told that “they” overcame; not “he” overcame, but “they” overcame. This is an obvious reference to a group of people (the Church) and not a singular person (Jesus). The chapter also refers to the woman’s seed being caught up and a remnant of that seed being left behind. This too implies a group of people and they hold the testimony of Jesus. It would not be said of Jesus that He held the testimony of Jesus. His testimony, as we shall hear later in Revelation, is the spirit of prophecy, The Church’s testimony is the testimony of Jesus as their Lord and Savior. This remnant, the remnant left behind after the Rapture, is the Tribulation martyrs who will suffer persecution and death under the reign of the Antichrist.✞

Taken from the book Revelation Pure & Simple by Terry Myers Smith