Revelation 12:12

Therefore rejoice, O heavens, and ye that dwell in them. Woe for the earth and for the sea: because the devil is gone down unto you, having great wrath, knowing that he hath but a short time.

Rejoice, O ye heavens ... The mention of sea and earth in the same verse seems to suggest that "heavens" here is used in the sense of "sky"; but its being used in the plural demands, in context, that it be understood as a reference to the dwelling place of the heavenly host.

Woe for the earth and for the sea ... The great significance in both the war episode and in this doxology is that human sorrows have implications far beyond life on earth. Why are there sufferings, persecutions, hatred, tribulations, doubts, and fears? Long, long ago, there was a war in heaven; and the defeated party was cast down to earth where we live. Satan hates God and all goodness, but he cannot attack God; therefore, he turns his malignant rage against the race of man. The quibbler may ask, Why does not God go ahead and destroy Satan at once in order to save all this? But the purpose of God requires that people be tested, and Satan is used of God for that purpose until all of the Father's designs are accomplished. Sometimes a dog when being punished will bite the stick through anger at the one using it; and people also have been known to wreck a room or a house through anger and frustration at something else. In a similar way, people are a tempting target for the rage of Satan because of the love lavished upon mankind by the Father. In this appears the explanation of all the woes of earth. Our conflict is not merely ours alone.

Angelic forces are also engaged. Our struggles are not to be shrugged off as insignificant. They are part of the great conflict between good and evil.[69]

Human woes and misfortunes are related to that cosmic struggle going on in a theater of far greater dimensions than those of mortal life alone. They are part of what Barclay called the "sleepless vigil of evil against good."[70] The vision of Revelation 12:7-12 was given to afford Christians a glance of the broader conflict of which their own trials are a part.

Because the devil is gone down unto you ... Here is the explanation of the whole phenomenon of evil, and we might add that this is the only true explanation. Several very important considerations appear in this: (1) the kingdom of evil is ruled and directed by an enemy of tremendous strength, energy, intelligence, and hatred; (2) his devices against people are motivated by satanic purposes of the utmost cruelty, savage hatred, and insane wrath; (3) this enemy is personal, Satan being a person of the magnitude of the archangel himself; and (4) he is aided in his nefarious designs by a host of angels constituting, before their fall, a heavenly host of a third of the angels in glory (Revelation 12:4), best understood as meaning a significant part, but a minority, of the heavenly host.

Having great wrath, knowing that he hath but a short time ... It is vital to understand the "short time" or "little time" mentioned here. The temptation to literalize everything in the book leads to some bizarre conclusions. Some see this as a very few years, months, or even days, just prior to the Second Advent, as Satan "sees his time running out." This has to be wrong, because Satan is not going to see his time running out. No angel of God, much less Satan, knows the day nor the hour of the Second Advent (Matthew 24:35). Beckwith spoke of the time when Satan would see that "he had but a little time before his overthrow";[71] but the maximum intensity of Satan's wrath crested to its full tide on Calvary, where it contained and defeated, where its fullest fury was spent and beyond which there could never be any greater intensification, just as no army deploying its maximum force and suffering a disastrous defeat can ever regain its original effectiveness. "From the moment Satan was cast down to earth, the moment of his defeat, the short time begins."[72] "This short time is the period of the world's existence from the advent of Satan until the final judgment."[73] As for the exact time of Satan's advent on earth, how could we know that? He was certainly in Eden where the great progenitors of the human race were attacked and defeated by him.

There may possibly be another thing intended by a subsequent mention of the "loosing of Satan" in Revelation 20:7ff, at a time when the dispensation is coming to a close, when the human race in large part shall have finally and irrevocably chosen to serve the devil. The disastrous consequences of that event shall usher in the end itself; but the wrath of Satan shall be no greater than it already is.

[69] Leon Morris, op. cit., p. 160.

[70] William Barclay, op. cit., p. 83.

[71] Isbon T. Beckwith, op. cit., p. 619.

[72] Charles H. Roberson, op. cit., p. 87.

[73] A. Plummer, op. cit., p. 314.