Come and study the Holy Scriptures with us as Father Stephen DeYoung teaches verse by verse on the podcast, The Whole Council of God.

Father Stephen holds a Ph.D. in biblical studies, and it's an Orthodox priest serving at Archangel Gabriel Orthodox Church in Lafayette, Louisiana.

Verse four, these are the two olive trees and the two lamp stands, standing before the

God of the earth.

So that's picking up imagery from the prophet Zechariah.

Right?

But... from the prophet Zechariah. Right. But the imagery is interesting because they used olive oil in the lamp stands. Right.

So these are both, they're presented as a source of life, right, on the one hand, and then lampstands

are associated, as we said before, with worship, right? Because there was a lamb stand in the

temple and the tabernacle. That was the image of each of the seven churches back at the

beginning of Revelation, right? so one of these is directed sort

of earthward right like the olive tree right and then the lamp stands are directed like worship

back toward god right so the idea here is that they're like two intermediaries.

Right.

So they not only have this prophetic role, but they have this priestly role.

Verse five, and if anyone wants to harm them, fire proceeds from their mouth and devours their

enemies. And if anyone wants to harm them, he must be killed in this manner.

So, they're out there in the oppressive world, right?

And so the idea here is that they're protected, right?

That God is protecting them while they're out there.

Verse 6, these have power to shut heaven so that no rain falls in the days of their prophecy.

We'll pause there.

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