The Cosmic Battle for Humanity

What happened in Bethlehem (Herod's murder of all baby boys two years old and under - Matthew 2:16), was yet another stage in the conflict God had announced in Genesis 3:15. 

And I will put enmity (warfare)

    between you and the woman,

    and between your offspring and hers;

He will crush your head,

    and you will strike His heel.”

The seed/offspring of the serpent would oppose and eventually seek to crush the seed of the woman. The story that began in Genesis 3:15 was now running on through Matthew 2:1-17 and 16:18 to its climax. John saw this conflict in dramatic and symbolic form in the book of Revelation: 

1 A great sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet and a crown of twelve stars on her head. 2 She was pregnant and cried out in pain as she was about to give birth. 3 Then another sign appeared in heaven: an enormous red dragon with seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns on its heads. 4 Its tail swept a third of the stars out of the sky and flung them to the earth. The dragon stood in front of the woman who was about to give birth, so that it might devour her child the moment he was born. 5 She gave birth to a son, a male child, who “will rule all the nations with an iron scepter.” And her child was snatched up to God and to his throne.

The "great red dragon" was "that ancient serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world" (v 9). And now, in the real-time version of John's vision, the Child had been born. The coming of the wise men was the first hint that the undeceiving of the nations had begun. And so the evil one let loose his lieutenant, King Herod, against the Child. 

We now live at a different point of John's vision: "The dragon became furious with the woman and went off to make war on the rest of her offspring, on those who keep the commandments of God and hold to the testimony of Jesus" (v 17). 

Perhaps as you look at the world around you today, it feels as though the dragon must be winning - as Christians around the world suffer attack and harassment, as non-Christians hear the Gospel yet remain blind to the message, and as Satan accuses and tempts you on the battleground of your own heart. Yet however fierce the heat, hold onto our Savior's promise: "I will build My Church, and the gates of Hell will not overcome it" (Matthew 16:18). 

Taken from The Dawn of Redeeming Grace by Sinclair B. Ferguson