The Resurrection and Ascension of the Two Witnesses

RV148-01

The Two Witnesses

Death

However, the people in that time will not understand the principle of death. They won't understand the implications of physical death. They won't understand what happens to them once they die physically, and what is on the other side, because they're not taught the information from Scripture. And they do not understand the horrendous future that is awaiting them if they have not accepted Christ as personal Savior.

Jerusalem

The Two Witnesses are Killed

Everyone Sees the Dead Bodies of the Two Witnesses

Liberal theologians, in the era of pre-television, used to read this particular passage of Scripture, and use it as one of their proofs that there are mistakes in the Bible. They challenged the accuracy of the Bible in declaring that an event could take place in the city of Jerusalem, which all the rest of the world could observe and could be a part of, because it says that these people are actually going to see this." They will look at their dead bodies. The liberal theologians would say, "It is obviously impossible for everybody in the world to be able to look at some event that takes place in the streets of Jerusalem in the future." They didn't know about the technology of television, which was to come in time, and which makes this something that is very easy to do.

People probably throng to Jerusalem to view the corpses at first hand. There will be, no doubt, long lines of people who are lining up to be able to see these corpses. The people who run tours to different parts of the world will see this is a great special event. They'll run "the corpse tour" in order for you to be able to see the people lying there in the city of Jerusalem. They will actually look. The word "look" in the Greek Bible looks like this: "blepo." This is the word in the Greek which means to focus your vision on something. There is a different Greek word when you talk about looking at a thing in a panoramic view. This is very significant because it tells us how people are going to act. They're going to walk up to these corpses, and they're going to look really close. They're going to get an intense gaze at these dead bodies.

The Antichrist

Unburied Bodies

In 1 Kings 21:24, this indignity of not burying a body is also indicated. The one belonging to Ahab, who dies in the city – the dogs shall eat, and the one who dies in the field, the birds of heaven shall eat." Here, Ahab and his wicked wife Jezebel are placed under the condemnation of God, and they are told that their family members will follow them in death. He says that it will be the kind of a death such that they will be left unburied. Dogs and birds will eat them up. This was a great indignity.

This same treatment is referred to in Jeremiah 8:1-2: "At that time, declares the Lord, they will bring out the bones of the kings of Judah, and the bones of its princes, and the bones of the priests, and the bones of the prophets, and the bones of the inhabitants of Jerusalem from their graves, and they will spread them out to the sun, the moon, to all the hosts of heaven, which they have loved, and which they have served, and which they have gone after, and which they have sought, and which they have worshiped. They will not be gathered or buried. They will be as dung on the face of the ground." God is declaring what is going to happen to those who have led Israel astray, particularly leading them into the worship of the pagans who worship the heavenly bodies. These who are guilty of this are going to be taken out of their graves, and will be scattered, again, for the animals to eat. This, again, is done in order to show God's displeasure and condemnation upon what they have done.

Jeremiah 14:16: "The people also to whom they are prophesying will be thrown out into the streets of Jerusalem because of the famine and the sword. And there will be no one to bury them, neither them, nor their wives, nor their sons, nor their daughters, for I shall pour out their own wickedness upon them." So, here again, you have an indication that God's judgment and humiliation upon those who are disobedient to Him is expressed by leaving their bodies unburied.

This treatment of a dead body is not entirely an old custom. It is with us today as an expression of hatred and contempt. Those of you who were alive during World War II will remember the pictures that we were suddenly shown in the newspapers, and finally in the magazines. Eventually, the people of Italy rose up in anger against Mussolini. We saw the pictures of where the people had captured Mussolini and his mistress. They had killed them, and then they tied them upside down – by their feet, like slabs of meat. Then the people in their indignation walked by, and they kicked the faces off the corpses in order to show their contempt. They let them hang there for days – upside-down in that position, while the people vented their rage against them. This is an expression of loathing – when you leave a dead body unburied.

So, this is what's behind the antichrist's action. He hates these two witnesses. He feels now that he has conquered their God; that he has demonstrated who he is; that he is superior to the God of heaven; and, therefore, he is happy that these, who have so long created so much problem for him, are there lying in the streets, and all of the world is viewing this.

Verse 10 describes the celebration of the world over the death of these two witnesses. And what they do in celebrating their death indicates how much they hated these people, and how much they did not like to hear what the two witnesses were saying in telling them that nobody goes to heaven without Jesus Christ as your personal Savior – the warnings of what was coming in God's judgment. And, of course, this is future history. These are things that are actually going to take place. They are in the future. This has never taken place as yet. So, you're getting a preview of history to come.

"Those who Dwell on the Earth"

This term may also note the orientation of the unbelievers as being earthly and temporal people – who have no thought for God. So, they are described as those who dwell on the earth. They are people who think that there's no tomorrow. They are people who think they will never die and face this God.

We're told that those who are in this category, loyalists to the antichrist, will rejoice over them. The word "rejoice" looks like this in the Greek Bible: "chairo." "Chairo" means "to be happy," and here it connotes gloating. These people are gloating over the fact that these men are now dead. For three-and-a-half years, they have wanted to kill them. Finally, their leader, the antichrist, has done this. Therefore, they decide to celebrate.

The Bible says, "They make merry." That is the Greek word "euphraino." These people are gladdened by something. That's what this word means. This word means "to be made glad," and it connotes enjoying yourself. Here, they are enjoying the fact that the two witnesses are dead. It brings them great happiness. In fact, this word connotes a sense of relief. Everybody feels now that things are going to get better. These two birds have been nothing but an irritation to them. They have they've had nothing to say except everything that no one wanted to hear about the doom that was coming upon them. And suddenly they are dead.

A Gift Exchange

This celebration will be worldwide, and people will go around wishing to each other a merry death day as they rejoice over the fact that this antichrist has finally finished off the two witnesses. Those who dwell on the earth (the antichrist's people) will be so relieved and happy over the death of the two witnesses that they will celebrate, and make merry, and they will express their joy by sending gifts to one another – sending and receiving gifts. Why? These two witnesses were prophets. This identifies the role that they had. They were men who were enabled by God to tell what the future is bringing – what the future is about to bring upon them. These two prophets tormented them.

The word "tormented" is the Greek word "basanizo." The word "basanizo" means to cause somebody a lot of personal misery. It connotes both physical and psychological suffering. The tribulation unbelievers are now euphoric because they have been released from hearing the preaching of the two witnesses.

Perhaps, some of you have experienced this yourself – being in a church service where you were glad when it was over, and to be relieved from the preaching you were listening to, that perhaps wasn't setting well with you. These people are rejoicing. Instead of repenting on the basis of the message received, they are rejoicing that these two prophets, who gave them so much misery, are done for.

These two men have been preaching for 1,260 days at the point of their death. They've been proclaiming God's message. That message has included the presentation of free grace salvation. They've made it very clear to people that you don't automatically go to heaven, just as you don't today. They made it very clear to people that everyone is condemned, because of personal sin, to spend eternity in eternity in the lake of fire. They made it clear to them that Jesus Christ has paid the penalty of death for them on the cross. They made it clear to them that they could have this eternal life simply by accepting Christ as their Savior. The same thing is true today. These men have made free great salvation very clear.

Furthermore, they have exposed the antichrist as Satan's tool. That really chapped his hide – that he was being exposed as the tomb of Satan, and that that was the source of his power.

Furthermore, they condemned the moral corruption of society, which will be horrendous in that day. If you think it's bad today, just stick around for the tribulation, and you'll see what real bad is.

Furthermore, he has warned them of the imminent judgment associated with the Second Coming of Jesus Christ to the earth. At this time, all Christians have been removed, that the rapture. There is basically nobody here to hold people back from the worst expressions of their sin nature.

These two witnesses have faithfully proclaimed these warnings. They furthermore, demonstrated the seriousness of their message by the way they dressed. They wore the garments reflecting sorrow. They pled with people to believe the Bible and to obey the true God. The preaching of the two witnesses has made those who dwell on the earth miserable, and their supernatural powers have simply frightened them.

The historical response of unbelievers to a faithful communicator of God's Word is always to want to silence him, and to be glad when it happens. They silence him in a variety of ways. You silence a true preacher of the Word of God by not attending church services. We have a lot of folks who are not here today who should be. They are home in front of the tube watching trivial, self-degrading content of one kind or another. However, they should be here, being ennobled and elevated in the Word of God. They have silenced the Word of God and the communicator by their absence.

Of course, the most effective way of silencing was as they did with the Lord Jesus Christ – simply to take his life. The unbelieving world wants to silence the people who are trying to guide them into an understanding of the Word of God. The people of Satan's world system are not the friends of God's people, no matter how cordial they may act. I hope that you are wise enough by now to know that. The people of this world can smile; they can glad-hand you; and, they can be very cordial, but they are not your friends. They are the enemies of God, and they cannot be the friends of God's children. The people of the world only tolerate godly believers whom they, in fact, hate. The Bible tells us that any Christian who is a good friend of the worldings of Satan is in fact an enemy of our Heavenly Father. This is taught us in James 4:4, where James says, "You adulteresses, do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Therefore, whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God."

That's a very serious bit of information. How close can you get with all those unbelievers that you associate with? How close can you get with all the unsaved people in the circle of your contacts? You are to be the lighthouse to them. You are to be the source of guidance of enlightenment to them. But at a certain point, you draw the line. If you do not, you will get burned. You cannot associate with a person who is not a Christian, and who is a devotee of Satan's world system that Satan has put together, and not change. You will become like them, or else you will separate yourself from them. You cannot be a friend of the world, and be a friend of your Father in heaven.

Well, the death of the two witnesses is viewed by the tribulation world as a triumph of the New Agers over biblical believers and their God. The tribulation believers will have had less and less to rejoice over as the tribulation judgments have progressed upon them. So, they're going to be really eager to have this excuse to celebrate for any reason at all, and certainly this has raised their hopes. The two witnesses are dead. They represented the God of heaven. Our antichrist leader has silenced them. They think that that God in heaven could not have prevented this. Therefore, they think that things are going to get better, and they're ready to celebrate. They're convinced that the God of the Bible has been defeated.

These gifts are exchanged to celebrate the killing of the two witnesses. No one has been able to do this for three-and-a-half years.

Christians exchange gifts at Christmas time to celebrate what God has done in the incarnation of His Son to be the Savior of mankind. These people exchange gifts to celebrate the death of the two men who are telling us about that incarnation for of the Savior of the world for our salvation.

So, remember, the godly people are always an unwelcome torment to the conscience of a society which tolerates wickedness. That's why it's so very hard when you have family members that you're related to, and you have to associate with them; you have to visit them; and, you have to be in contact with them. Yet, they are abysmally ignorant of spiritual matters. They are people of this world system, and you go along with them with as much collegiality and grace as you can, but sooner or later, you come up against the fact that you must separate yourself from the things that they want to do; the things that they enjoy; and, the things that they think are a lot of fun. Godly people are always an irritation. At that point, your relatives wish that you'd go back home.

The death of the two witnesses does not falsify the message which they have brought from God. This is a serious mistake which the world will make at this point in time. Their deaths, as a matter of fact, simply mark the end of God's day of grace for the world. If these two men testify in the last three-and-a-half years of the tribulation (as I think is true), their deaths come just a few days before Jesus returns the second time. At this point, the final blows that we will begin looking at next (the seven bowls of God's wrath) start being poured out by God in rapid succession, one after another, so that in a very short span of time (a matter of weeks), the worst of God's judgment is poured out upon the tribulation world. This is His last testimony for people to wake up and to change their minds.

So, when these two men die, it's not anything to rejoice over. It's not a sign that their message was false. It is a sign that God is about through waiting. If the two witnesses have ministered faithfully, then God's Word is going to come to pass. Evil people love to sin without being condemned. They are wicked. They don't want to hear that they are destined for punishment. They don't want you to tell them that they're acting wickedly. And they will try to dismiss the authority of the Bible, because that's the one thing they cannot throw out.

Scripture will be Fulfilled

All that the antichrist has done in killing the two witnesses is, in fact, to ensure his own destiny and that of his followers in the lake of fire. Please remember again that Revelation 20:15 tells us that this is where he is headed: "If anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire." This is the destiny of all those who followed the antichrist. Unbelievers always naively think that they can escape God's judgment against evil by silencing those who have come to warn them. In the ancient world, it was the practice of some kings that if a messenger came and brought bad news from the battlefield, they killed the messenger. And that's what the antichrist is trying to do. He is trying to kill the people who are bringing him the bad news.

However, the sufferings of God's witnesses, when it is rejected by the world, is only for a short time. When the world abuses you and me as Christians; when they reject our witness; and, they subject us to some suffering, please remember, that it's only for a short period of time. John 16:20 says, "Truly, truly, I say to you that you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice; and, you will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will be turned to joy. The antichrist's sorrow seemingly has now been turned to joy. But he is mistaken. It will be short-lived.

Resurrection

This is a phrase that you find many times in the Old Testament. Genesis 2:7 tells us about the breath of life which God put into Adam when He created him. Genesis 6:17, Genesis 7:15, and Genesis 7:22 use this term "the breath of life." This brings a person from unconscious death into conscious life. God suddenly raises to life His two witnesses by returning to them the breath of life. It is actually a matter of fact that all human deaths are only caused by one thing. All death in the human race is caused by one thing, and that is asphyxiation. Everybody in the human race dies of asphyxiation. ... But what it means is that there are a variety of causes, but ultimately, something causes you to stop breathing. And when you stop breathing, that's when you die. All death is caused when suddenly the body no longer has oxygen flowing through it, and that's the end.

So, the term "the breath of life" is going right to the core of where life is. For God to put life back into these corpses requires that they start breathing. Everybody knows that when somebody is in a situation where they have been injured, the first thing people should do is stop the bleeding and keep the breathing. CPR is all about how to keep a person breathing, and to keep them alive until you can get help to them. If you've ever taken a scuba course for certification, you go through a really difficult portion where they put a person on the bottom of the pool. (He's got his regulator in his mouth, breathing.) But you have to dive down there and pretend that this person has gone unconscious. If the regulator is out of his mouth, you have to grab him in the right way; pull him to the surface; and, then take him to shore. And while you're doing that, you give him artificial mouth-to-mouth respiration, to keep him breathing until you get him on the shore, where you can do the next stage of keeping him alive. It's a difficult and a very strenuous exercise, but it's done because that's what you have to do to stay alive. You have to have the breath of life in the body. It has to be kept there.

So, all human deaths are caused by asphyxiation. God reverses that in the case of his two witnesses by giving them the breath of life.

Also, lo and behold, while the camera is grinding, these two witnesses come back to life. The Bible says, "They stand up on their feet." They stand up on the street before a watching world – right there on nightly news. And it suddenly shows that God has not been defeated. But in fact, the antichrist, who claims to be God, has himself been defeated. Again, by this very act, the testimony of the two witnesses is confirmed by this supernatural act of God. No one, for centuries, has seen a dead body race to life. Since apostolic times, we have not seen a dead corpse raised back to life. Suddenly, before all the world, what has not been seen by anybody for centuries takes place.

The result upon all those who are having a merry death day celebration is that great fear falls upon them. The Greek word is "phobos." That means "a terror." The merrymakers are suddenly thrown into an intense terror. The party is over, and they are now terrified by the true God that is doing something that nobody has seen in their lifetime, and for centuries before. This probably takes place, as I say, near the end of the tribulation.

Then, as if this isn't enough, while people are shaking in their boots, looking at this all over the world because it's on TV, verse 12 says that these two men are suddenly taken into heaven. The people in Jerusalem are watching, and they hear a voice from heaven. We're not told whose voice this is. Perhaps it is God's voice, but the voice says, "Come." This is the Greek word "anabaino." "Anabaino" means "come on up." It is in the imperative mood in the Greek, which is a command from God. God commands his two witnesses to come on up to heaven. This is loud enough for everybody to hear. This is the voice of the God whom the New Ager says doesn't exist and isn't up there. That's really embarrassing. They've all been told that there's nobody up there, and now they're hearing a voice from someone up there.

Ascension to Heaven

Well, the ambassadorial mission of these two men is completed. Therefore, God is ready to take them home. Now all the world of the antichrist knows that the two witnesses have been accepted by the God of heaven. That confirms the truth of their message. Eventually, in spiritual matters, you should remember that we are going to find out who's right and who's wrong. When people are taking issue on spiritual matters, eventually, we're going to find out who's right and who's wrong. God isn't going to let this hang out there in the wind with no decision. Now suddenly, these people have discovered who was right and who was wrong. There is no doubt now about what they've heard, and no doubt many of them will probably reconsider the testimony of the two witnesses about Jesus Christ.

These raised bodies of the two witnesses are now immortal and sinless as 1 Corinthians 15:54 says the bodies of believers will be. Christians are to be taken from the earth to heaven in a similar manner in the rapture, except ours will be an instantaneous move, and nobody will watch us go. They will just suddenly discover that we're gone. 1 Thessalonians 4:17 and 1 Corinthians 15:52 tell us about this departure, and this sudden transformation.

This scene, again, is really another example of God's grace in confirming His salvation offer to the unbelievers who live on the earth. He is again, in fact, by this very act of letting them see these two witnesses being taken to heaven at a command from Himself in heaven, is giving them a confirmation of what they have heard, and again giving them a gracious opportunity to change their minds.

"They heard a loud voice from heaven saying to them (as a command), 'Come up here.' And they went up into heaven in the cloud, and their enemies beheld them."

In contrast to the Christian's departure and the rapture, the world will see this. The enemies are the "echthros." These are the people who oppose the two witnesses. The world intently watches the resurrection and the ascension of the two witnesses, comparable to the day we all sat glued to our television in 1969, when we watched the landing on the moon. The door opened, and the first astronaut came down the steps, and he finally made that last step when everybody held his breath. Everybody thought that evolution was true, and because evolution was true, the moon has been evolving over a period of millions of years. Therefore, the moon has to be covered with several feet of dust. The astronauts were told, "You may sink down. You don't know how far you're going to sink down when you step on the moon." Well, evolution was not true, and there was only an inch or two of moon dust, and when they stepped down, Armstrong made that famous statement, "One small step for man; one giant leap for mankind."

Well, this is the kind of anticipation that these people are going to have as they watch, with bated breath all over the world, these two men gradually ascending into heaven. And you can imagine the disbelief which will be in the voices of the news reporters who are observing this event. It will probably be something like what the reporter sounded like who was reporting the crash of the Hindenburg, the dirigible that Germany had produced – this splendid, airborne, lighter-than-air vessel that had just crossed the Atlantic, and was circling around waiting for a storm to pass so that it could hook up at Lakehurst, New Jersey. I was a teenager at the time, and I was listening to the radio. I was listening to this commentator as he was describing the approach of this airship. He was saying, "Now they are coming to the tower. They're getting very close. The Navy men are down below. The lines have been dropped from the dirigible. They are about ready to hook up. Oh, oh, oh, my God." And he started breaking up.

So, I'm listening, and he says, "It has exploded. It has caught on fire. It's falling. Oh, oh, the people are falling out of it. Oh, those poor people. Oh, I can't help it. Ladies and gentlemen, I'm sorry. I can't speak anymore." And he went silent. They recorded that. I've heard that several times since, and it is awesome. It is scary.

Now, what do you think these reporters are going to do when they suddenly say, "And there we are, ladies and gentlemen. These are the two miserable men who have opposed our new society. You will notice that the maggots on their dead bodies are considerably more today than they were several days ago. They're really beginning to have a feast here now.

Oh ... but ... Did he move? I think he did. How could he move? Ladies and gentlemen, I can't believe this. They're standing up. The maggots have all gone. These guys are healed. They're well. They're standing up before us. Oh, my. I can't believe this. What's happening here? Did you see that? Am I going crazy? Are they rising in the air? Did you hear that? Someone said, 'Come up here.' There they go. Follow them. Follow them. Get the camera on them." These guys are going to be bananas to see this scene, because it's going to happen in history, and it's going to happen just like an ordinary thing. Suddenly, this great event is going to take place. They will not know what to make of it. But I'll tell you that in that moment, all of the arrogance of the New Age intellectuals and the humanists is going to be squelched, as they are proven wrong before the whole world.

A Great Earthquake

So, here this earthquake is another signature of God upon the event. He's responsible for this. The result is that a tenth of the city of Jerusalem is destroyed, and 7,000 people in that city are killed in this earthquake. They are the enemies of the two witnesses. They cannot escape this divine judgment. Some of these people were participants in refusing to bury the corpses of the two witnesses. Now God has buried them in an earthquake in the rubble of their homes. This is similar to a prophecy that you can read in Ezekiel 38:19-20, which is to take place in the tribulation, and which describes the horrors of an earthquake.

God's judgment on this city exposes again the false occult religion of the antichrist. When God comes down and proceeds to execute His judgment, it makes us think of Hebrews 10:30-31 where God says, "For we know Him, who said Vengeance is Mine. I will repay. And again, the Lord will judge His people. It is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God." The colonial preacher Jonathan Edwards used to preach a powerful sermon on that 31st verse: "It is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God." And he would draw a mental picture of God holding an unbelieving sinner over the pit of hell. And people would scream. Women would faint. People would rush forward to accept Christ as Savior, as he shook them in their mind's eye over the pit of hell. This is exactly what is now going to happen to the antichrist. His occult system is brought down on his head.

Well, the result is that the rest (the survivors) were terrified. This is the Greek word "emphobos." It means intense fear. The survivors are now in total horror. The antichrist has been exposed as a fraud. And what did these people do? It says kind of a strange thing. It says, "They gave glory to the God of heaven." This is the word "doxa." The word "doxa" means "to give honor." This does not mean that these people have now believed in Christ as Savior and been saved. The survivors are in great fear. So, they honor God in the sense of having an awe for one's enemy.

Luke 5:26 and Luke 7:16 describe how people were in awe of Jesus Christ because they were fearful as the result of what they had seen Him perform. These people are not saved. Their pride keeps them from admitting that they were wrong. They bear the mark of the antichrist, and they are subdued. That is all that this means. They are placed in terror, and now they are in great resentment.

The result is like a conquering general whom you hate as your enemy, and who is now treated with respect because of what he has accomplished. So, these people know that it is a God –, the God of creation. There is a God up there – the God of heaven, who has done this. The result is that they now express great respect for Him, but they still hate Him. They will not bow themselves to Him. Pride keeps them from accepting Him.

However, finally, God does get some respect from them. Eventually, He will get total respect, for Philippians 2:10-11 say that, eventually, in the future, "At the name of Jesus, every knee should bow, and of those who are in heaven, and on earth, and under the earth (in Hades), and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father." Someday they're all going to show Him respect.

So, God is glorified in the sense of the fact that they fear Him. This is the God of heaven. This term is used only one other place, in Revelation 16:11, which clearly identified Him as the true God. This term is found several times in the Old Testament, but only twice in the New Testament.

This is at the end of the tribulation, very near the Lord's return to this earth. Then verse 14 says, "The second woe is passed. Behold, the third woe is coming.

We began this interlude between the judgments represented by the blowing of the sixth trumpet and the judgments represented by the blowing of the seventh trumpet with an interlude that backtracks and gives a little more picture of what is happening at this time. At the start of this, we were told that three great woes were coming. This that we have just looked at now is the second woe. The third one will now be the blowing of the seventh trumpet. When the seventh trumpet sounds, the final series of seven of God's judgments will be poured out upon the earth. They are viewed as seven bowls of God's wrath. This happens at the very end, in a matter of days or weeks near the end of the tribulation. This 14th verse indicates that that woe is about to begin.

Next time we will begin our study of this third and final woe upon the tribulation world.

Dr. John E. Danish, 1989

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