# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1855 03 27_S124
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

124

a devouring fire, and proves itself such in their conscience when it refutes them, condemns them and kills them spiritually. The enemies indeed, as we read in v. 7, return all that bodily, but with poor success, because earthly power can hinder the kingdom of God as little as a stone on the street disturbs the bird in the air in its flight.

"thus" stands here with special emphasis. One will kill them bodily. Thus they do not kill, but with the sword of the Word of God, in that, as was said before, fire proceeds out of their mouth.

V. 6. "These have power," etc. —: All the elements wait upon them in service, as upon Elijah and Moses: for the Creator is with them. At the same time their spiritual power is here set forth, whereby they make manifest that the crowd which adheres to the Antichrist is under the ban and accomplish in truth all that of which their enemies falsely boast.

V. 7. "And when they shall have finished" —: that is a comfort: they must first complete their work, sooner no one may touch them.

"the beast, etc. — shall kill them." — This points to the raging outbreaks of the old enmity which the Antichrist cherishes against these witnesses. He kills bodily those who have overcome him with spiritual weapons. Moreover, we are not here to think of a particular period of time which would have put an end to the victorious testimony of the truth, but just as it is described in this place, so it has befallen, through the whole 1260 days, the witnesses who appeared one after another within this time.

V. 8. "And their dead bodies shall lie," etc. that is to say: As far as the dominion of the Roman Antichrist reaches ("in the street," etc.), the banned and murdered witnesses of Christ will publicly leave behind no honorable memory, but one will even after their death curse them from the pulpits and speak of them with abhorrence; yea, one will not even permit their corpses a Christian burial, as the ashes of the dear martyr, the blessed John Huss, were strewn into the Rhine under dreadful execrations. But that the confessors of the LORD, to whom it was to go so, should not take this too much to heart, the LORD adds at the close of this verse what He thinks of the mighty kingdom which under His name does His servants such shame, in that He, in visible emotion of holy wrath, calls the most holy papacy the great city, "which spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified." Rome is called Sodom on account of the vices that prevail there, Egypt on account of the darkness that reigns there, and because it is the seat of the Pharaoh in Christendom, who, while he calls himself and his anointed crowd "spiritual," oppresses with forced labor the Israel that was begotten of the Spirit; and with Jerusalem it is compared, "where also our Lord was crucified," because it continues to persecute Christ in His members, as it already made a beginning of it when the high council took refuge with the Roman scepter, in order to bring Jesus to the gallows of the cross, and harbors and shields a false doctrine which has received its sentence in Gal. 3, 1.

V. 9. "And their dead bodies," etc. —: After their death these witnesses will first become truly known, yet one will remember them in such a manner as if it were over with them: their dead bodies one will see. Also they shall not receive so high a name as later Luther, of whom all the world received tidings, but "some" peoples only, etc., as for example the Bohemians, will hear something of them, and where one hears of them one will yet not everywhere take heed, so that one "generation" shows sympathy to them before another. Nevertheless in some "tongues" they are spoken of and what they have left behind in writings will be read, so that one can well see that the Holy Ghost digs through their memory a bed for the testimony of Christ, that it may not go as men reckon.

"three days and a half" —: half a week long, Dan. 9, 27 ("in the midst of the week he shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease") is reckoned from the crucifixion of the LORD to the destruction of Jerusalem just so long: an indication that the Roman papacy, as it in resistance against Christ follows after the apostate Jerusalem and crucifies the LORD in His members, will also suffer like punishment. In the midst of the week, when its arrogance has risen to the highest, it shall fall. That is again a comfort for those witnesses and all who shall sigh over their shame.

V. 10. "And they that dwell upon the earth," etc.: Why, one might ask, does God permit that His Church on earth lies so deep in the dust and the enemy may triumph over the witnesses of the truth? Here we have the answer. The earthly mind of the children of men likes it so. It would rather have the Antichrist for lord than Christ. The wholesome grace of God, which chastens it, vexes it, even though no earthly power is at the command of the mouth which proclaims it to it. Therefore it has over the death of the upright preachers a merry life, like Herodias over the head of John the Baptist. It still adds money if it can only get rid of the word of the cross, as indeed after the death of the blessed John Huss the traffic in indulgences came into favor indeed, and the papacy received great "gifts" for this, that it wove veils out of its lies to shield the weak eyes of the old Adam from the rays of the truth of the Word of God.

V. 11. "And after three days," etc.: that is the time of the Church Reformation. "The Spirit of life from God entered into them": men could not do it. The sense is: the same spirit of witness which earlier was quenched received now from the LORD such power that it could hold the field and resist the papacy, as indeed Luther has become a terror to the Pope.

V. 12. Into hell those witnesses had been cursed. Now the tide turns. God's Word is made manifest. In the light of it they ascend high up — "in a cloud": for the cloud of witnesses, which since the time of the apostles has glorified Christ, receives them, and the public judgment of Christians grants them the seats of honor prepared for them by God. Their enemies, however, must let it happen and have the more torment, as formerly their wantonness prospered.

V. 13. Upon the antichristian papacy God's wrath is now revealed from heaven in the same measure in which the witnesses of the truth conquer and are crowned with honor. The earth quakes: for everywhere powers stir which threaten the papacy; yet it is overcome only with the weapons of the Spirit, it is not wholly overthrown.

"the tenth part of the city fell" —: these are the parishes which since the Reformation have fallen away from the Pope and have accepted the pure confession.

"and in the earthquake were slain of men seven thousand names" —: by this may be understood those who in the struggle with the papacy lost their bodily life, without "the others" being thereby frightened from giving honor to the God of heaven, although they did it with trembling, because the Antichrist or the god of the earth was angry and it meant something when one confessed Christ; one might also be allowed to take this passage so: many saints whom the Man of Sin had made came now into contempt and were made manifest as mere "names of men," so that those who had hitherto held to them, and as the monks had already belonged with them, recognized with horror how dreadfully they had been led astray and henceforth served the true God in faith. To this explanation the number 7 especially entitles, which partly reminds of something holy, partly indicates completion. It is thus at the same time given to understand that with the canonizing it is pretty nearly at an end: the number of the saints is now full.

V. 14. "quickly" —: in falling, speed increases; therefore it goes with the judgments of God, to which the world falls prey, ever faster toward the end.

V. 15.–19. The victory which the servants of the LORD have won on earth is celebrated in heaven and crowned with promise. The festal peal of the eternal victory, of the perfect revelation of the zeal of God against all adversaries, resounds on the last day. The Holy Ghost descends with rich gifts upon the Church, in order with His light to glorify "the ark of His testament," Christ. In short: what took place at the baptism of the LORD, as we read Luke 3, 21. 22., that is repeated in Christ's holy body, for a comforting testimony to us, that all the conflict which the congregation of God has to endure with the powers of darkness is comprehended in the word which the LORD spoke to the children of Zebedee, when He said:

"Ye shall be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with." Matth. 20, 23.