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In this message we will continue to consider the experience and enjoyment of Christ as the Word of God — King of kings and Lord of lords.
According to Revelation 19, the church is both the bride who is presented to Christ and the warrior who fights with Him against God’s enemy. The armies in Revelation 19:14 are the called and chosen believers in 17:14. They are also both the bride and the guests called to the marriage dinner of the Lamb (19:7-9). The guests invited to the wedding feast and the bride are the same. The bride consists of the invited guests, and the invited guests make up the bride. After the wedding, all the guests will become the army. As the bride, we must be beautiful, without spot or wrinkle, and be clothed in fine linen. As the warrior, we must be equipped to fight against God’s enemy.
In Revelation 19:14 we see that the overcomers, as the armies which are in heaven and the ones who followed Him on white horses, are “dressed in fine linen, white and clean.” The fine linen here is the clothing of the bride. The wedding garment of “fine linen, bright and clean,” will be the armor for fighting. The overcomers who are the heavenly armies are those who constitute the bride of Christ. In other words, it will be the bride of Christ who will follow Him as His army to fight and destroy Antichrist and his army. Those who have overcome every obstacle will be Christ’s co-fighters in the final battle against Antichrist. These are His bride. They have become His co-fighters by His ministering the rich life supply to them. Surely the expectation is that His overcomers will be such co-fighters.
The overcoming saints have two garments, one for salvation and the other for reward. The fine linen here is the second garment. This second garment of the overcomers qualifies them both to attend the marriage dinner of the Lamb (vv. 8-9) and to fight with the Lord against His enemy. Thus, the wedding garment becomes the fighting garment. The second garment qualifies us not only to attend the wedding but also to join the army. The bride’s wedding garment will be the uniform that she wears as God’s army to fight against His enemy. As we have seen, this garment is Christ lived out of us to be our daily righteousness. Even today, we are fighting by Christ as our garment. Ephesians 6 indicates that the whole armor of God is Christ. Furthermore, the Lord’s army will be on white horses as a properly formed heavenly army.
At His coming again, the Lord Jesus first will meet His bride. After receiving the bride, Christ and the overcomers will enter into battle against the enemy. According to Revelation 19:11, the Lord will ride on a white horse, and the armies which are in heaven will follow Him on white horses, dressed in fine linen, white and clean.
Just as in Ephesians 5 and 6 we see the church as the bride and as the warrior, in Revelation 19 we also have these two aspects of the church. As the church, we are the bride and the warrior. In God’s economy there is one army constituted of a corporate warrior. This means that the warrior in Ephesians 6 is a corporate entity. Only as a corporate entity, the Body, can we put on the whole armor of God. This is contrary to the concept held by many Christians that an individual believer is able to wear the entire armor. The armor in Ephesians 6 is not for Christians as individuals; it is for the church corporately as the Body. What this chapter reveals is not the believers fighting as individuals but a corporate army fighting the battle for God’s interests on earth.
Spiritual warfare is not an individual matter; it is a matter of the Body, a corporate entity to fight the battle against God’s enemy. No soldier in a modern army would enter into battle by himself. Rather, he would fight as part of a well-trained and fully equipped army. After we have been formed corporately into an army, we will be able to fight against God’s enemy. God’s strategy is to use the church as His army to fight against the enemy. Therefore, it is very dangerous to be isolated from the army. Only by remaining in the army will we have the necessary protection.
According to Ephesians 6, the Lord with His might is the armor that we put on for our protection. This means that we, as the Body, need to put on Christ Himself as our armor. In order to fight in the spiritual warfare, we must have Christ as the whole armor of God. In 6:14-17 there are six aspects of Christ as the armor: the girdle of truth, or reality; the breastplate of righteousness; the firm foundation of the gospel of peace, the shoes; the shield of faith; the helmet of salvation; and the sword of the Spirit. Therefore, the whole armor of God consists of the girdle, the breastplate, the shoes, the shield, the helmet, and the sword.
According to verses 17 and 18, we receive the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit by means of all prayer and petition. Actually, prayer is the means by which we receive all the aspects of the whole armor of God. It is by praying in spirit that we apply the girdle of reality, the breastplate of righteousness, the shoes as the firm foundation of the gospel of peace, the shield of faith, the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit.
Among the various items of the armor, only the sword is for offensive warfare; that is, it is the only item of God’s armor used for attacking the enemy. In spiritual warfare we must deal not only with the objective enemy but even more with the subjective adversary. Satan is not only the enemy outside of us; he is also the adversary within us. Today we face a greater problem with the inward adversary than with the outward enemy. The attacks of the enemy from without are not as serious as those of the adversary from within. To deal with this inward adversary, we need to experience the killing power of the word. Yes, the enemy is outside of us, but his elements are within our being. Because the enemy’s elements are within us, we need the killing power of the word to be applied to our being subjectively.
In Ephesians 5 the word is for nourishment that leads to the beautifying of the bride, but in Ephesians 6 the word is for killing that enables the church as the corporate warrior to engage in spiritual warfare. Pray-reading the Word of God is the way to kill the adversary within us. Every day and in every kind of situation, we should pray-read. Whenever we are troubled by something negative within us, we should take the Word of God by means of prayer in spirit. As we do this, the negative element will be killed.
In Ephesians 6:17 Paul charges us to receive “the sword of the Spirit, which Spirit is the word of God.” This means that we need to take the word of the Bible as a sword for fighting the enemy. According to Paul’s word in this verse, the word of God is the sword not directly but indirectly. Paul speaks of “the sword of the Spirit, which Spirit is the word of God.” Here we have indirectness. The sword is not the word directly. Rather, the sword is the Spirit directly, and then the Spirit is the word. This indicates that if we would deal with the enemy Satan, the word of the Bible must become the Spirit. If we would use the word of the Bible as a sword to kill the enemy, in our experience the word must be the Spirit.
We need to realize that things such as our opinion, thought, temper, emotion, natural life, and point of view are often used by the powers of darkness in the air to damage the Body life. As brothers and sisters in the church, we all have our emotion, thought, opinion, and natural life, and we all have our own point of view. Quite often we are offended, not due to the wrongdoings of others but simply due to our emotion or opinion. Due to their emotion, sisters are easily offended. Suppose an older brother speaks a word to a particular sister, and she is offended because of her emotion. Then the evil power in the air comes in to take advantage of her emotion, and she determines not to forget that she has been offended. Apparently the problem is her emotion. Actually the problem is that her emotion has been taken over by the evil force in the air. This means that the real enemy is not this sister’s emotion but the evil spirit in the air that takes advantage of her emotion in order to damage the church life. If the enemy is to be defeated in this situation, the sister must learn to receive the word as the Spirit, which becomes the sword to deal with the enemy. As we read the Word of God, we receive the word in a living way as the Spirit, and the Spirit, which is the word, becomes the sword that kills our emotion directly and kills the evil force indirectly. The word that we receive as the Spirit then becomes the sword to slay the enemy. Apparently the sword of the Spirit kills our emotion; actually it kills the evil spirit in the air who takes advantage of our emotion.
Revelation 19:15 says, “Out of His mouth proceeds a sharp sword, that with it He might smite the nations; and He will shepherd them with an iron rod; and He treads the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God the Almighty.” The fighting of Christ in the war at Armageddon will be the treading of the great winepress. That will be the judgment on all the evil forces of the world, the deathblow to all of them. Through Christ’s treading, the wrath of God the Almighty will be exhausted. All the grapes, the Gentile military forces, will be gathered into the winepress and will be trodden by the Lord Jesus.
In keeping with this, Revelation 14:19 says, “The angel thrust his sickle into the earth and gathered the vine of the earth and cast it into the great winepress of the fury of God.” The great winepress of the fury of God is the war at Armageddon (16:12-16), which is in the valley of Jehoshaphat (Joel 3:9-16). All the Gentile evil worldly forces will be gathered there, and the Lord with His overcoming saints will fight against and destroy them there (Rev. 19:11-21; Joel 3:9-13; Isa. 63:1-6). Revelation 14:20 goes on to say, “The winepress was trodden outside the city, and blood came out of the winepress up to the bridles of the horses for a thousand six hundred stadia.” (A stadion, the singular of stadia, was equal to about six hundred feet.) When Christ comes back to earth and destroys these evil fighters, treading the winepress of the fury of God, the result will be a river of blood as high as a horse’s bridle and approximately two hundred miles long.
In 2 Thessalonians 2:8 Paul says, “The lawless one will be revealed (whom the Lord Jesus will slay by the breath of His mouth and bring to nothing by the manifestation of His coming).” The breath of the Lord’s mouth signifies the word. Revelation 19:15 speaks of a sharp sword with which He might smite the nations. This sharp sword, a two-edged sword (1:16), is the Lord’s killing word. He will send out His word as the breath to slay Antichrist and to consume him. The Lord will also destroy Antichrist with the brightness of His coming. This brightness will be an intensified burning and a killing light. Christ will come with such a mouth and such light to deal with this man of sin. As a result, Antichrist will become the son of perdition and be the first to perish in the lake of fire, and along with the false prophet, he will perish in the lake of fire before Satan will (19:20; 20:10).
The sword, which proceeds out of the mouth of Christ, who is the Word of God, is the word that will judge the rebellious (John 12:48). When the Lord Jesus comes to fight against Antichrist, He will not need modern weapons. The Lord’s word is more powerful than any weapon. When the Lord says, “Antichrist, go to the lake of fire,” we will say Amen, and Antichrist will immediately be cast into the lake of fire. This is the Lord’s way of fighting. Undoubtedly, Antichrist will use the most modern weapons, but Christ will defeat him with the sharp sword, the almighty word that proceeds out of His mouth.
The Lord will not only smite the nations but also shepherd them with an iron rod (Rev. 19:15). This is the fulfillment of Psalm 2:8-9, which tells us that Christ will rule the nations with an iron rod. In Psalm 2:9 God gave Christ authority to rule over the nations. In the millennial kingdom the ruler is a shepherd. To shepherd here means to rule, and the iron rod signifies strong power. Christ will first smite the nations with His judging word; then with His strong power He will shepherd those who remain. His ruling with strong power is His shepherding. He will rule over the nations by shepherding them. Today the elders shepherd the church with love, not with a rod of iron. However, because the nations will still have the rebellious human nature, the Lord will shepherd them during the millennium with an iron rod. That the nations will still have a rebellious nature is proved by the fact that they will follow Satan to make war against Christ at the end of the millennium (Rev. 20:7-9).
Revelation 19 corresponds with Daniel 2, in which we see that the nations devastate Israel consecutively in four empires, from Nebuchadnezzar, the first king of Babylon, to Antichrist, the last Caesar of Rome. These four empires that devastate Israel are the Babylonian Empire, the Medo-Persian Empire, the Macedonian-Grecian Empire, and the Roman Empire. These four empires are signified by the four parts of the great human image in Daniel 2. The head of gold (vv. 36-38) signifies Nebuchadnezzar, the founder and the king of Babylon. The breast and the arms of silver (v. 39a) signify Medo-Persia, and the abdomen and thighs of bronze (v. 39b) signify Greece, including Macedonia. The legs of iron and the feet partly of iron and partly of clay (v. 33) signify the Roman Empire with its last ten kings (vv. 40-44a; 7:7-11, 19-26; Rev. 17:7-13). At the beginning of the great tribulation (Matt. 24:21) the form and appearance of the Roman Empire will be restored under Antichrist. According to the books of Daniel and Revelation, the last Caesar of the Roman Empire will be Antichrist, who will be supported by ten kings (Rev. 17:10-12).
The four empires will, however, be overcome and terminated by Christ. Daniel 2:34 says that “a stone...cut out without hands” struck “the image at its feet” and “crushed them.” Verse 35 continues, “Then the iron, the clay, the bronze, the silver, and the gold were crushed all at once, and they became like chaff from the summer threshing floors; and the wind carried them away so that no trace of them was found.” Here the great human image signifies the aggregate of human government, and the smiting stone signifies not merely the individual Christ but also the corporate Christ. Apparently, the parts that were of gold, silver, bronze, and iron were not a problem to God. But with the ten toes there is a great problem, for when human government reaches the stage of the ten toes — the stage of Antichrist and his ten kings — it will fight against God directly. Thus, human government not only rebels against God, exalts man, and worships idols but also fights against God directly. However, Christ, the embodiment of God, will come with His bride to crush the human government.
When Christ comes as the smiting stone, He will not come alone. Rather, He will come with His bride. This is because when Christ comes to fight against Antichrist and his army, He will come as the Son of Man. As the Son of Man, He will need a counterpart to match Him and complete Him. This counterpart will be His bride. After gaining and marrying the church as His bride, Christ will come as the smiting stone. If Christ did not have a bride, He would have to fight alone against Antichrist and his army. However, Christ will have an army, and this army will be His bride. On the day of His wedding, Christ will marry the one who has been fighting the battle against God’s enemy for years. This means that Christ will marry the overcomers, who have already overcome the evil one, the devil (Rev. 12:11). As the God-cut stone, Christ with His overcomers — the corporate Christ — will strike the ten kings with Antichrist (19:11-21), signified by the ten toes of the great human image. In so doing, the corporate Christ will crush the great image from the toes to the head (Dan. 2:35); that is, the corporate Christ — Christ with His newly-married bride composed of the overcomers — will come as a stone cut without hands and smite the human government into pieces. In this way, Christ with His bride will annihilate human government.
Revelation 19:16 goes on to say, “He has on His garment and on His thigh a name written, KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS.” The King of kings refers to His authority, and the Lord of lords refers to His headship. He is the authority and the head of the whole universe.
In His ascension, Jesus as a man was inaugurated into the new position of King of kings and Lord of lords to be the Head over all things. He has received all the authority, and He has the name which is above every name (Phil. 2:9). He is higher than all the presidents on the earth. There have been many great men throughout the ages, but all of them died, and few are remembered. However, the Lord Jesus Christ is different. The more people oppose Him, the more transcendent He is and the more people believe in Him; the more people oppress Him, the more He multiplies. If we read history carefully, we will see that the clever kings would not persecute the Christians, because they knew that whoever persecutes the Christians would never have a good end. Hitler, who was the worst persecutor of God’s people in modern times, had a very pitiful end, dying without a proper place for burial. History also tells us that governments that persecuted Jesus Christ have fallen quickly. The Manchu dynasty in China was ended because it instigated the Boxers to kill the Christians. This is known as the Boxer Rebellion in modern Chinese history. Christ is the King of kings and the Lord of lords. The Roman Caesars, Napoleon, and Hitler were not the Lord; only Jesus Christ is the Lord.
A day is coming when Christ as the King of kings and the Lord of lords will appear to the universe. The fact that Christ is King of kings and Lord of lords will no longer be hidden or mysterious. This name will be written upon His garment and upon His thigh; hence, it will be openly revealed and known by all. He will fight for His kingdom. The garment signifies Christ’s attributes, especially His righteousness in His humanity, and the thigh signifies Christ’s standing strength, His stability. His title King of kings and Lord of lords is exhibited in His righteousness and stability.
Revelation 19:19 says, “I saw the beast and the kings of the earth and their armies gathered together to make war with Him who sits on the horse and with His army.” According to this verse, Christ’s enemies are the beast, Antichrist (undoubtedly including his associate, the false prophet), and the kings of the earth and their armies. The kings of the earth (16:12-14) especially include the ten kings under Antichrist (17:12-14), and the armies include the two hundred million cavalry troops from “the rising of the sun” (9:16; 16:12).
The war mentioned in Revelation 19:19 is an actual physical war, not a spiritual one; it is a war between God and man. Specifically, Christ — as the Son of Man, the King of kings, and the Lord of lords — with His followers, who are human beings, will fight against Antichrist, also a human being, and the kings of the earth and their armies. Antichrist will fight against Christ directly and personally.
Revelation 19:20 goes on to say, “The beast was seized, and with him the false prophet, who in his presence had done the signs by which he deceived those who received the mark of the beast and those who worshipped his image. These two were cast alive into the lake of fire, which burns with brimstone.” Antichrist and the false prophet will be the first group to go into the lake of fire, the universal “trash can.” These two had already died but were raised again, not by God but by Satan. Now they will be the first to go directly into the lake of fire, without passing through further death or resurrection like all the others who perish.
Revelation 19:21 continues, “The rest were killed with the sword which proceeds out of the mouth of Him who sits on the horse.” As the result of the war at Armageddon, Christ will defeat Antichrist, who, with the false prophet, will be cast alive into the lake of fire. Then the rest of Antichrist’s armies will be killed with the sword that proceeds out of the mouth of Christ, who is the King of kings and Lord of lords (v. 16). This verse again indicates that the Lord will fight simply by His word, which will be a weapon to kill His enemies.
