The Church will not be silenced

Throughout the New Testament age, as the church witnesses to the truth of God, she suffers abuse for doing this. But although she does, the Word of God prevails and will not be silenced throughout the whole New Testament period.

And if any man will hurt them…(The two witnesses, the true church)…fire proceedeth out of their mouth, and devoureth their enemies: and if any man will hurt them, he must in this manner be killed. Revelation 11:5, KJV

This is a reference to the fact that the church of the New Testament has the power that the prophet Jeremiah had in the Old Testament.

Behold, I will make my words in thy mouth fire, and this people wood, and it shall devour them. Jeremiah 5:14, KJV

The Word that the church is called to bring either adds to those who are in the inner sanctuary of the temple (the true people of God), or it burns the enemies of God up in the destruction of hell. It devours them as a fire out of her mouth. The Word she brings will always be a power. Is not my word…a fire? saith the Lord (Jeremiah 23:29). If any man tries to silence that power during the New Testament age, it will not ultimately work. The Word of God will prevail unto the salvation of His own. The church of Christ will always speak that Word as a fire out of her mouth. That is the point, too, of the reference in Revelation 11:6 to the other Old Testament prophets. We have Jeremiah in Revelation 11:5. In Revelation 11:6 we have Elijah, who shut heaven, that it rain not. We have Moses, who turned the water to blood and called the plagues upon Egypt.

The point is that those faithful prophets of the Old Testament, who brought the Word of God with sackcloth, calling those around them to repentance, who preached in spite of opposition, continued and prevailed in the preaching of that Word in spite of that opposition. So the church will preach the truth of Christ in the New Testament age. And in spite of opposition, she will not be silenced. That is the point of Revelation 11:5 and Revelation 11:6.

This reminds me of the intriguing story of John Hus and Martin Luther. John Hus was a Czech, and what we call a pre-reformer. He is one who paved the way for Luther and the other reformers. Luther didn’t rise out of a vacuum; there were others who had gone before him too. John Hus and his followers (called the Hussites) preached against the heresies of Rome and promoted the gospel of Jesus Christ about 100 years before Luther. The Roman Catholic Church, however, in her hatred for the gospel of Christ, burned John Hus at the stake in 1415 and attempted to stamp out the message of the truth of God's Word. Before they lit the fire upon John Hus at the stake, Hus said this: You may burn this goose, but there shall arise a swan after me that will not be silenced. The last name Hus in Czech means goose. John Hus was saying, You may burn me, the goose, but God’s truth is not going to die out. God will raise someone after me who will not merely be a goose, but who will be a swan, who will be able to preach this truth more beautifully, more clearly and more gorgeously than I ever could.

In 1514, the Pope of Rome believed that he had the true preaching of God’s Word completely stamped out of the world. He had burned John Hus and he had killed most of the followers of John Hus, the Hussites. In wicked arrogance this statement was made in 1514 by an official Roman Council, the Lateran Council: The whole body of Christendom is subject to [one] Head, the Pope. No one now opposes us; no one now objects. Three and a half years later Martin Luther, who was influenced by the work of John Hus, nailed his 95 theses to the church door in Wittenberg. And he began to preach the truth of God's Word, and did so more thoroughly and more beautifully than John Hus did before him. He was the swan that Hus believed was coming. And that is why, if you see some pictures of Martin Luther from the Reformation era, many of them will show Luther with a swan behind him. Google Martin Luther with swan and you may see so. People knew Luther was the swan.

The gospel was not silenced, and never has been through the history of the New Testament age, although the attempt is made all throughout to stop the light of God's truth from shining. Under Nero, under Domitian, under the Roman Catholic Church, under communist regimes there was persecution. But the fire of the Word of God goes forth out of the mouth of the church of Jesus Christ. She is not silenced!¹

Cory Griess