See again how God's victory and Satan's fury upon the earth are intertwined.
The salvation of God, the power of God, the kingdom of God have come. And the authority of the Messiah, of Jesus Christ. We live in the time of His power and of His kingdom.
In Job we see Satan accusing Job before God (Job 1,2). In Zechariah we see Satan accusing Joshua the high priest before God (Zec 3).
Now look at the grammar carefully in v10b. Satan is accusing the brothers and sisters day and night, present tense. Yet he has been thrown down from heaven, it has already happened. Our accuser has been ejected from heaven.
Why was he hurled down? We triumphed over him. How? By the blood of the lamb and the word of our testimony. There is God's part and our part. In Rom 10 Paul says we need to believe in our heart and confess with our mouth. Now remember the significance to the people of the time this was written, especially the significance of the importance of the word of their testimony. There were times and places when all sorts of pressure was put on them, sometimes with terrible persecution, not to say that Jesus is Lord. We may face a time in this country when we face persecution. We need to realise how important and how powerful is the word of our testimony. For by it we defeat the enemy. That is why he is so keen to keep us quiet.
John emphasises this with the end of v11, "they did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death". This is an encouragement and a command not to give in to persecution.
So the heavens can rejoice, but for a time there is terrible woe upon the earth.
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