REVELATION 11 CONTINUES THE SECOND Revelation 11 continues the second woe (11:14) with the
appearance of God’s two witnesses, who have been given great
power through the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. This power
allows them to release judgment on the earth in the same manner
as Moses and Elijah. Often these two are interpreted as two men,
yet the Bible reveals something different. These two are not men
as many have supposed, but are identified as two olive trees
and two candlesticks (11:4). With this
identification, we know these two are Israel and the Church (as
the evidence below will make clear) which have reawakened to the
power of Christ (the Holy Spirit), being purged and made white
through the persecution of the Antichrist (Dan. 11:35; Rev.
6:9-11).
The
witnesses, now filled with power, appear during the
three-and-a-half years of great tribulation during the same time
period in which Christ’s wrath is poured out. They will be a
witness for Christ for three and a half years, releasing His
judgments on earth in a similar manner as Moses and Elijah.
These power-filled witnesses are a small remnant who was not
martyred by the Antichrist in the global holocause of Jews and
Christians. They now have experienced a true revival and the
fullness of the Holy Spirit, fully trusting Christ during this
period that has seen most of God's people and over one half of
the earth's population up to this time killed. Through the fire,
the church and Israel are awakened and Become power filled.
For
years, I taught the traditional view that these two must be
Moses, Elijah, or Enoch. But then it struck me that to come up
with this view was without clear scriptural support. I began to
look again at this passage and realized the passage tells us who
these two are--they are actually four--two olive trees and two
candlesticks, which we will identify below:
“I
will give power to my two witnesses, and they shall prophesy a
thousand two hundred and sixty days, clothed in sackcloth. These
are the two olive trees, and the two candlesticks standing
before the God of the earth” (Rev. 11:3-4).
I
then had to ask if Scripture had anything to say about olive
trees and candlesticks. It did, and what I discovered was that
Scripture is clear concerning who the olive trees and
candlesticks are—they are Israel and the church. Here are two
Scriptures clearly identifying the olive trees:
“If
some of the branches be broken off, and you being a wiled olive
tree, were grafted in among them, and with them partake of the
root and fatness of the olive tree." (Rom. 11:17).
“The
LORD called your name, A green olive tree, fair, and of goodly
fruit” (Jer. 11:16a).
These two Scriptures clearly identify Israel as the natural
and green olive tree, and the church as the wild olive tree
grafted into Israel. To understand these witnesses as two men is
to moves away from the context of the Scripture.
Scripture
also clearly identifies the church as candlesticks:
"The mystery of the seven stars which you saw in my right
hand, and the seven golden candlesticks. The seven stars are the
angels of the seven churcheees: and the seven candlesticks which
you saw are the seven churches" (Rev. 1:20).
Though
each of the seven churches in Revelation 2 and 3 are a
candlestick, yet the two candlestick witnesses are not seven in
number, but only two. The reason is because there were only
two of
the seven churches that were faithful witnesses of Christ,
without any of their members encouraged to repent—the church at
Smyrna and the church at Philadelphia (2:8-11; 3:7-13). Smyrna
was encouraged to be "faithful, even to the point of death"
(2:10). Philadelphia was honored "because you have kept the word
of my patience" (3:10). The other five churches did not have the
Holy Spirit alive within them. They had conformed their
Christianity, and tolerated sin. Scripture is clear the
candlesticks refer to the church.