Life Project Blog

Revelation 16:8-16

The fourth angel poured out his bowl on the sun, and the sun was allowed to scorch people with fire. They were seared by the intense heat and they cursed the name of God, who had control over these plagues, but they refused to repent and glorify him. (16:8-9 cf. Deut. 28:22)

The fourth bowl is poured out “on the sun” and men are afflicted with fiery heat. Throughout this age, from John’s time to ours, there have been many periods of global warming and global cooling which are recorded in history. Some historians even point to these as causes of wars and revolutions. Over the past twenty years, we have heard a great deal about global warming, but when scientists, and especially politicians get hold of this, it would seem that they haven’t read history. Didn’t I hear that Al Gore said a year or so ago, that global warming has “nothing to do with the sun”? Well, I’ll look that up, but for now, maybe the politicians aren’t proposing the right solution for this problem. Maybe, instead of telling us that we are bad people who should pay more in costs and taxes and lower our lifestyles, they should be telling us to repent and turn to God…

But alas! Scripture tells us this isn’t likely; men will simply curse God instead.

The fifth angel poured out his bowl on the throne of the beast, and its kingdom was plunged into darkness. People gnawed their tongues in agony and cursed the God of heaven because of their pains and their sores, but they refused to repent of what they had done. (16:10-11; cf. Na. 3:11; Hab. 3:12-14; Rev. 17:9 ff.)

When the great powers of this world fall, there is despair; this is the record of the age in which we live. There have been many great, powerful and glorious empires, but they all fall apart eventually. The beast and his Satan-given power cannot overcome God, and for this reason, it cannot overcome His Church.

The sixth angel poured out his bowl on the great river Euphrates, and its water was dried up to prepare the way for the kings from the East. Then I saw three impure spirits that looked like frogs; they came out of the mouth of the dragon, out of the mouth of the beast and out of the mouth of the false prophet. They are demonic spirits that perform signs, and they go out to the kings of the whole world, to gather them for the battle on the great day of God Almighty. (16:12-14)

As the sixth bowl is poured out, the river Euphrates dries up. Keeping in mind that Revelation is not intended to be understood literally, we have another symbol of this world in that famous river so closely associated with the ancient Assyrian and Babylonian Empires. When this happens, the way is opened for all of the nations of the earth to make war on God’s Church. Next, John sees demons come forth from the mouths of the dragon and the two beasts. Remember that the dragon is Satan, the first beast represents anti-Christian governments and the second beast represents anti-Christian philosophies and religions, thus everyone is being filled with evil and monstrous ideas, and preparing for battle with God. In other words, this is the culmination of Satan’s ages-long conflict with God; he’s putting everything on this one last roll of the dice.

“Look, I come like a thief! Blessed is the one who stays awake and remains clothed, so as not to go naked and be shamefully exposed.” (16:15; cf. Matt. 24:29 ff.; 1 Thess. 5:4; 2 Thess. 2:8; 2 Pet. 2:10)

All of a sudden, out of nowhere and completely without warning, Jesus returns “like a thief” (unexpectedly). Would you be ready if He came today?

Then they gathered the kings together to the place that in Hebrew is called Armageddon. (16:16)

The stage is set for the pouring out of the seventh bowl; first, a brief note about Armageddon: So much has been written about Armageddon, so much speculation has been given… and there is so much to say. Since it is dealt with in more detail later, I’ll save my remarks on it for our discussion of Rev. 19 and 20…

The seventh angel poured out his bowl into the air, and out of the temple came a loud voice from the throne, saying, “It is done!” Then there came flashes of lightning, rumblings, peals of thunder and a severe earthquake. No earthquake like it has ever occurred since mankind has been on earth, so tremendous was the quake. The great city split into three parts, and the cities of the nations collapsed. God remembered Babylon the Great and gave her the cup filled with the wine of the fury of his wrath. Every island fled away and the mountains could not be found. From the sky huge hailstones, each weighing about a hundred pounds, fell on people. And they cursed God on account of the plague of hail, because the plague was so terrible. (16:17-21)

Satan has gathered all of his forces together for one last push to destroy God’s eternal purpose, and out of nowhere Jesus appears on the scene and the seventh bowl is poured out. Satan, his allies, friends and unwitting tools are obliterated; evil of every form and kind is terminated and God’s judgment is complete. From this point forward, the earth no longer has any consequence of sin or death, there is no pain or suffering, and God’s people reign with Christ forever.

Revelation 16:1-7

To begin this section, I must first tell you clearly that to fully comprehend this chapter, we must stop thinking as the world around us thinks, and look at this with a heavenly perspective. As we will see, when the bowls of God’s wrath are poured out, God’s judgment will take place. The text tells us that the wrath of God applies only to those who have followed the dragon or the beast, but as we will see, followers of Christ can be caught up in the same events that are judgment upon the unbeliever standing next to the Christian, and both of whom might be killed at the same time. To illustrate, we might hear someone say that so and so (a Christian) lost their battle with cancer yesterday. We are sad because so and so has died of that dread disease, as though their story has ended! Yet in truth, that person’s story hasn’t ended at all; it’s only just begun, and now they get to the good part. If you happened to read my story, then you understand how I can say this with such a degree of certainty; if you missed that post, click here.

In our discussion of chapters 8-11, I set out the parallels between the Exodus story and Revelation, and these apply once again in Revelation 16. I won’t go over the details again, but I will give the Exodus verses where applicable as we go along…

The first angel went and poured out his bowl on the land, and ugly, festering sores broke out on the people who had the mark of the beast and worshiped its image. (16:2)

Throughout this age, people will be afflicted by diseases and other physical ailments, some of which are quite terrible, think of Herod for instance. For the believer, they are not judgments because Jesus has overcome death, and through Him so have we (Rom. 8:28), but for the non-believer they can be either God’s warning (trumpet) or God’s judgment (bowl). See Rev. 16:2; cf. EX 9:10; Deut. 28:27; Acts 12:23.

The second angel poured out his bowl on the sea, and it turned into blood like that of a dead person, and every living thing in the sea died. (16:3)

This is very much like what we have seen earlier with the trumpets. It conveys images of maritime disasters, destruction of food supplies, and we should also recall that the sea represents this world that is so full of war, death and destruction. (Cf. EX 7:17-21; 15:1; Ps. 48:7; 78:53).

The third angel poured out his bowl on the rivers and springs of water, and they became blood. Then I heard the angel in charge of the waters say:

“You are just in these judgments, O Holy One,     you who are and who were;  for they have shed the blood of your holy people and your prophets,     and you have given them blood to drink as they deserve.”

And I heard the altar respond:

“Yes, Lord God Almighty,     true and just are your judgments.” (16:4-7)

Fresh water supplies are compromised (cf. EX 7:24; 1 Ki. 17:1; 18:5, 40). Then the angel cries out that God’s judgments are entirely just, for the wicked have made martyrs of God’s holy people, and the voice of the martyrs from underneath the altar, an image we saw in earlier passages, sound forth their agreement (cf. Rev. 6:9; 8:3-5).

I looked, and there before me was a white cloud, and seated on the cloud was one like a son of man with a crown of gold on his head and a sharp sickle in his hand. Then another angel came out of the temple and called in a loud voice to him who was sitting on the cloud, “Take your sickle and reap, because the time to reap has come, for the harvest of the earth is ripe.” So he who was seated on the cloud swung his sickle over the earth, and the earth was harvested.

Revelation 14:14-16

The time for God’s final judgment is at hand; John turns and sees Jesus, sitting on a cloud, wearing a crown of victory, and ready for the harvest, sickle in hand. An angel comes forth from the Temple, God’s symbolic dwelling place with the command to the Mediator to harvest His own. The scene reminds us of John the Baptist when he spoke of Jesus in Matthew 3:12: “His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor, gathering his wheat into the barn and burning up the chaff with unquenchable fire.” Next comes the judgment of the wicked:

Another angel came out of the temple in heaven, and he too had a sharp sickle. Still another angel, who had charge of the fire, came from the altar and called in a loud voice to him who had the sharp sickle, “Take your sharp sickle and gather the clusters of grapes from the earth’s vine, because its grapes are ripe.”  The angel swung his sickle on the earth, gathered its grapes and threw them into the great winepress of God’s wrath. They were trampled in the winepress outside the city, and blood flowed out of the press, rising as high as the horses’ bridles for a distance of 1,600 stadia

Revelation 14:17-20

Another angel comes out to announce the final judgment of the wicked, those who have refused to follow Christ and accept grace, but who instead chose to follow the beast (dragon). Then John mentions a second angel who comes from the altar. Remember that the altar and its incense has already been used by John to represent the prayers of the redeemed. Thus, we can see here that God’s final judgment is also His final answer to the prayers of His people for relief from the evil of this present evil age; interesting, don’t you think?

They go forth to harvest the “grapes” of the earth, and they are put into the winepress of God’s wrath and crushed. Instead of grape juice, blood flows from the winepress and covers an area of 180 miles (1600 stadia)… 1,600 is the product of 4 X 4 X 10 X 10. Do you recall what the number four represents? It is the number of the earth. 10 X 10 is a hundred, representing the complete and total number of the wicked, thus we can see that the earth has been entirely cleansed by the judgment of God on all of the evil that has dwelt here.

It always strikes me as interesting, when I read these verses, that we often hear people talking about going to “hell”, the lake of fire, brimstone and burning Sulphur and all of that, but when was the last time you heard a sermon about the wicked being crushed in the winepress of God’s wrath? All of these images come from non-literal passages. None of them are intended to be taken literally in Revelation, even though they are very vivid images describing the horror of opposing God. Yet we want to take one literally, and ignore the other… Maybe that is just the work of culture and tradition more than anything else.

In the next post, let’s pause and reflect on what we’ve seen in this vision, for there has certainly been a lot on display here!