Revelation 11:3-12 shows us the two witnesses, who will be martyred, resurrected, and raptured to the heavens in the cloud at the close of the great tribulation. These two will be Moses and Elijah, God’s living witnesses. Moses, representing the law, and Elijah, representing the prophets, both testified for God. They will be martyred by Antichrist, and their corpses will be on the street for three and a half days. Then they will be resurrected and raptured in the eyes of all their persecutors. As the overcomers, the two witnesses will be rewarded and will be in the kingdom. Moses and Elijah appeared before the Lord on the mount of transfiguration (Matt. 17:1-3). That was a miniature of the manifestation of the kingdom.
We can see from our fellowship that the overcomers are those who live the life of a martyr. To be martyred is glorious. During the Boxer Rebellion in China in the early 1900s, many Christians were martyred. One man told me the story of a young girl who was martyred during this time. He was working one day when the Boxers were parading on the street with their long swords in a threatening way. He looked through a crack in the door and saw them leading a young Christian girl to her death. Instead of being frightened, she was singing and praising. When this man saw her, he was shocked and said to himself that there must be something special about being a Christian. Because of this, he sought to find out what this “foreign religion” of being a Christian was, and he was saved by the Lord. Actually, he was saved through that young martyr. Later, he gave up his business and became a traveling preacher. When I was in Chefoo, he told me this story of how he was saved and became a minister of Christ. This young martyr, through whom he was saved, was a real overcomer.
Now we want to see the final consummation of the overcomers. We need to see what the overcomers consummate and accomplish.
Eventually, all of the overcomers will be manifested as a corporate overcomer after their raptures. After they are raptured, they all become one entity. They are really built together. This can be proved by two things. First, all the overcomers become one bride to Christ (Rev. 19:7-9). Christ will not have many brides, but only one bride, who is constituted with all the overcomers. This is proof that all the overcomers will become one. Second, they become the heavenly army to follow Christ to defeat Antichrist and those who follow him (vv. 11-21). All the overcomers first become the bride, and after her marriage to Christ, the bride becomes the army. All the overcomers are really one.
This means that today, in this age before the rapture, we have to learn the lesson of how to be one and of how to coordinate with one another with no opinion. We should reject our opinion and care only for our growth in Christ, transformation in Christ, and building up in Christ. If we are such persons, the church life will be pleasant to us. When we are right persons, everything is right and pleasant to us. But when we are wrong persons, we are unhappy and everything is wrong and unpleasant to us. When we are right in an overcoming situation, we love everything and everyone, and every situation is no problem to us. Today in the church life, those who condemn and criticize others are the wrong persons. If someone comes to us to say something negative about the church, about the elders, about the ministry, about the brothers, or about the sisters, we have to realize that this person is a wrong person. We should stay away from such persons (Rom. 16:17). Otherwise, we will be contaminated. In this age we have to learn the lesson to coordinate with all the lovers of Christ. Then after our rapture, we will be ready to go along with one another, and we will be one entity as Christ’s bride and Christ’s army.
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