Apocalypse Revealed #551
551. Which leads the whole world astray. This symbolically means that they pervert everything having to do with the church.
To lead astray means, symbolically, to pervert, and the world, like the earth, symbolizes the church (no. 285).
The world does not mean the physical world, but the church in it, in the following passages:
The earth will mourn and be turned upside down; the world will languish and be turned upside down. (Isaiah 24:4)
The lands will learn Your judgments, and the inhabitants of the world Your righteousness. (Isaiah 26:9)
The Maker of the earth by His power, who prepares the world by His wisdom... (Jeremiah 10:12; 51:15)
The foundations of the world were uncovered... at the blast of (Your) breath... (Psalms 18:15)
The earth is Jehovah's and its fullness, the world and those who dwell therein. ...He has founded it upon the seas, and established it upon the rivers. (Psalms 24:1-2)
The heavens are Yours, the earth also is Yours; the world and its fullness, You have founded them. (Psalms 89:11)
...He will make them inherit the throne of glory. For the foundations of the earth are Jehovah's, and He has set the world upon them. (1 Samuel 2:8)
(Babylon,) you have made the world as a wilderness... ...you have destroyed your land and slain your people. (Isaiah 14:17, 20)
And so on elsewhere, as in Isaiah 18:3; 26:18; 27:6; 34:1; Nahum 1:5; Psalms 9:8; 77:18; 98:9; Lamentations 4:12; Job 18:18; Matthew 24:14; Luke 21:26; Revelation 16:14.
It should be known, however, that when the world and the earth are mentioned together, the world symbolizes the church in relation to good, and the earth the church in relation to truth.
Revelation 12
1
A great sign was seen in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars.
2
She was with child. She cried out in pain, laboring to give birth.
3
Another sign was seen in heaven. Behold, a great red dragon, having seven heads and ten horns, and on his heads seven crowns.
4
His tail drew one third of the stars of the sky, and threw them to the earth. The dragon stood before the woman who was about to give birth, so that when she gave birth he might devour her child.
5
She gave birth to a son, a male child, who is to rule all the nations with a rod of iron. Her child was caught up to God, and to his throne.
6
The woman fled into the wilderness, where she has a place prepared by God, that there they may nourish her one thousand two hundred sixty days.
7
There was war in the sky. Michael and his angels made war on the dragon. The dragon and his angels made war.
8
They didn't prevail, neither was a place found for him any more in heaven.
9
The great dragon was thrown down, the old serpent, he who is called the devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world. He was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him.
10
I heard a loud voice in heaven, saying, "Now is come the salvation, the power, and the Kingdom of our God, and the authority of his Christ; for the accuser of our brothers has been thrown down, who accuses them before our God day and night.
11
They overcame him because of the Lamb's blood, and because of the word of their testimony. They didn't love their life, even to death.
12
Therefore rejoice, heavens, and you who dwell in them. Woe to the earth and to the sea, because the devil has gone down to you, having great wrath, knowing that he has but a short time."
13
When the dragon saw that he was thrown down to the earth, he persecuted the woman who gave birth to the male child.
14
Two wings of the great eagle were given to the woman, that she might fly into the wilderness to her place, so that she might be nourished for a time, and times, and half a time, from the face of the serpent.
15
The serpent spewed water out of his mouth after the woman like a river, that he might cause her to be carried away by the stream.
16
The earth helped the woman, and the earth opened its mouth and swallowed up the river which the dragon spewed out of his mouth.
17
The dragon grew angry with the woman, and went away to make war with the rest of her seed, who keep God's commandments and hold Jesus' testimony.
