And John saw in that vision
And John saw in that vision
And John saw in that vision that little scroll which represented the taking back of the earth and he took it and he put it in his mouth because he was told it, "Take it and put it in your mouth and eat it up, swallow it." And he said he did it and he said in my mouth it was sweet and in my belly it's bitter. What do you mean, John? I mean, when I see the coming of Jesus Christ in His glory I have a sweet taste because Christ deserves to reign and reign in glory, but I also have a bitter taste because when He comes in glory to reign I know it's going to mean the devastation and eternal damnation of the world. And so it's sweet and bitter.
Now before that seventh trumpet sounds, there's another glimpse of God's grace in chapter 11. Oh this is powerful, watch this. These are my two favorite people in the Bible and I don't even know who they are, apart of course from our Lord. I just think these two guys are terrific. I don't know who they are and if the Lord's looking for volunteers, I volunteer. Now listen. Remember I told you a little while ago that at the mid point of the Tribulation time there would be a 144 thousand Jews who would go to preach the gospel? They would have had to have been converted. Here are the two guys I believe that God will use to bring them to conversion. Now the visions are taking us back again to fill in some more details about the Tribulation. You can ask the question...how did the 144 thousand get saved? Well how does anybody get saved? By believing the Lord Jesus Christ. Well how did they hear? How can they hear except there be a preacher, right, Romans 10. And how can there be a preacher unless somebody gets sent? So who is sent? Here they are, two witnesses. And I believe their ministry is a thousand two hundred and three score days. That's a year...that's three and a half years...1260 days, three and a half years. That is the first half of the Tribulation, I believe.
And I think these two guys go through the first half of the Tribulation...why? When the church is taken out, who is left to evangelize the world? Nobody. The 144 thousand aren't sealed until the second half so who have you got in the gap? Have you got God without a witness? Hardly, you've got these two. And there are two olive trees, two lampstands, standing before the God of the earth. And watch this, and of course the earth is going to hate them. I mean, the world is going to hate them. The New Age society is going to hate them. The people who explain the Rapture away by saying... Hey we removed all those people who were holding us back from reaching the next level of consciousness. They're going to hate them. And when they preach Jesus Christ and so forth, they're going to hate them.
But you know what happens? If any man hurts them, verse 5 says, fire proceeds out of their mouth and devours their enemies. "Haaah!" I mean, you could get used to that. You're being persecuted and antagonized and they don't believe your message and they try to take your life...Haah! And they have power to shut heaven. In other words, they can go into a place, they want to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ and as long as they preach they'll cause a draught to happen. And they can control the weather. They have power over waters to turn into blood, smite the earth with all the plagues as often as they want.
Now what do you think is going to be on the news each night? Next we have our two witnesses report. This week they were in Cincinnati, it didn't rain, all the rivers turned to blood and people were struck with plagues. We've got to do something about these two guys but every time we try....we go up in smoke.
And you know what will happen? Finally the Beast comes right out of the pit, the Beast himself. And he overcomes them and he kills them and their dead bodies, when they die, you know where they are when they die? They're in Jerusalem. That's right. That great city spiritually called Sodom and Egypt, verse 8 says, where our Lord was crucified. So they're murdered in Jerusalem.
Can you imagine what the news will say? Finally, they're dead. And it says they leave their bodies in the street. Now this is in our modern time. You don't leave bodies in the street. They leave them in the street. The people and kindreds and tongues and nations see their dead bodies three days and a half. Now how can a whole wide world see three dead bodies in Jerusalem? Only one way, how's that? Television. It couldn't be true a hundred years ago, they couldn't have seen them all over the world. And they don't permit their bodies to be put in graves. Why? Because they're so excited, they rejoice, make merry and send presents...happy dead witnesses day, here's your gift. That's right, the world is so happy that these guys are dead. And I can just see some reporter standing there saying, "Well, they've been dead now for three and a half days and we are so relieved that these men are removed from the earth..." and then in verse 11 it says, "After three days and a half the Spirit of life from God entered into them and they stood on their feet..." And I'd like to see the instant replay on that one. "And fear fell on them who saw them." Don't you imagine it did? And that's what's going to happen.
And then I love this. "And a voice from heaven said, Come up here." Whoooo! See. And they did. The same hour there was a great earthquake, tenth part of the city fell, in the earthquake were slain of men seven thousand, the remnant were terrified and gave glory to the God of heaven. Terror, sheer terror. God uses those two to win the 144 thousand. Listen, God will never be without a witness, will He? Never.
And after that little interlude we come back to the seventh trumpet. And when it blows it's the finale, folks. I love this, the...verse 15, "The kingdom of this world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ and He shall reign forever and ever." That's it, folks. When that seventh trumpet blows the kingdoms of the world belong to Jesus Christ. Marvelous...marvelous.
Chapter 12 goes back to pick up some more details before we get to the final seven bowls. And it describes Satan's incessant persecution of Israel and the Messiah and the people of God. It talks about how he has always warred against God's people. The woman in this chapter is Israel, the child is Christ, the dragon is Satan. And the dragon has always been after the child born of the woman. And he has fought in the past and he'll fight in the future. Verse 7 says Satan's demons and Michael and his angels are going to have war in heaven. Guess who will win. Super angel Michael and his angels will win. They'll throw, verse 9, the end says, cast out into the earth all the demons.
Now what happens is, listen...you've got demons that have come out of the pit now like locusts all over the place. You've got demons that have been floating around in the air, rulers in high places, they're thrown down. So you've got them out of the pit on the earth, cast out of heaven, no longer having access to God as Satan did in Job when he went before the throne of God. They'll all be to the earth. And on the earth the incredible result of a demonically infested world. And the attack has always been sort of directed at Israel but the rest of chapter 12 talks about how He protects Israel...how God wonderfully protects them. In fact, at one point this whole host of...this army is chasing Israel and the ground just swallows them in verse 16, just opens up and swallows them all. Marvelous.
Chapter 13 picks up another detail. It introduces us to the Antichrist, the world ruler. And he's something. He leads all this attack on God's people. In verse 4 at the end it says, "Who is like him? Who is able to make war with him? He has a mouth speaking great things and blasphemies and power was given to him to continue 42 months." That's three and a half years. The last half of the Tribulation again. He opened his mouth in blasphemy against God, blasphemed His name, His tabernacle, them that dwell in heaven. It was given him to make war with the saints and overcome them. And power was given him over all kindreds and tongues and nations. He has tremendous power, tremendous influence. He also has a cohort. Chapter 13 verse 11 to the end introduces the False Prophet. The Beast is the Antichrist, the False Prophet is his cohort. It's like Pharaoh had Jannes and Jambres, like Balak had Balaam, like Absolom had Ahithophel, the Antichrist will have his cohort. And his job is to point everybody to the Antichrist, tell them all to worship the Antichrist. And he performs some lying wonders and lying signs and he builds a big image to the Beast and makes it come alive through some electronic ventriloquism or whatever it talks about in verse 15, or better yet, he puts a demon right in that idol itself and it becomes a demon-possessed idol. And now the world is so utterly demon influenced that everybody in the world could potentially be a raving maniac, like the boy we read about who fell in the fire and fell in the water and foamed at the mouth and rolled in the dirt. Everybody in the world could be like the demoniacal of Gadara who lived in the caves and cut his body all over the place with stones because he was so demon infested. The whole earth is literally crawling with demons and they're in control of everything. And they even are able to make an image speak and it draws the whole world to worship the Antichrist and that's the job of the False Prophet.
And then he says in verses 16 to 18 that in this vision he saw that if you didn't have a number you couldn't buy or sell, you couldn't operate in society. And the number was 666. That isn't significant except that it represents man. Man was created on the sixth day, seven is God's perfect number and no matter how hard man tries he's always 666, he's short of perfection. So it's the number of man's system. It's always curious to me that all the taxi cabs in Israel start with the number 666 then a dash and then the rest of the numbers. I don't think that's particularly significant, it's just interesting. But what is significant is...(laughter)...what is interesting and what is significant is that you can't operate in this society unless you have the number on your forehead or on your hand. And we're getting to that, we already have credit cards and numbers. If you have a bank card where you can go stick your bank thing in, punch your number in to the deal, you've already got your number. Connected with your bank card number, they know exactly who you are and they can find out everything about you. And if they decided that you couldn't buy or sell, all they've got to do is remove that number of you have a cashless society. And the problem with a credit card is you lose it so they're developing ways to put it on your hand and your forehead because in a cold climate those are the two parts of your body that are readily exposed and can be scanned easily. And so Antichrist will rule the world and he'll accommodate it all and he'll control it all because of the power he has.
I told you last time that they now have developed...and this is incredible to me...they're trying to develop computer chip implants where they can put a chip in an individual, right in your body that's compatible between your brain, the chip and a computer system so that in whatever profession you're in, you can have instant access to all material in a library that will come right from the computer into your chip and into your brain. And if you just did that with a guy like Antichrist, for sure he can control everything.
Verse 1 of chapter 14 looks again to the victory of the Lord Jesus Christ. You see that the 144 thousand are in heaven and they're having a great time singing praise. And they're singing praise because of the victory of Jesus Christ.
Now, of course, all of the holocaust comes to final focus in Armageddon. And if you look over at chapter 14 verse 14, and we'll move more rapidly through this remaining part, rest easy. We're on schedule here. But in chapter 14 we begin to get a glimpse of Armageddon and this idea of thrusting in the sickle in verse 15, a sickle in the reaping and the harvest always speaks of judgment. And so God begins to come in judgment. And this is another way of looking at what happens in the sixth trumpet or the sixth seal. The Lord comes in terrifying judgment.
Verse 20 sums it up. The winepress is trodden outside the city and the blood came out of the winepress even to the horse's bridle, that's four or five feet high by the space of a thousand six hundred furlongs. That's 200 miles, that's the length of Israel...five feet deep the length of Israel is used to symbolize the blood bath. And grapes have no strength against the smiting feet of Almighty God, and so you see God tramping out His judgment.
And the world will be judged. In fact, earlier in the chapter verses 9 to 12 he says, "Hang in there, saints, be patient, because God is coming in judgment." And if you're martyred, if you die as a martyr, verse 13, blessed are you who die in the Lord. So don't worry about that, God's working out His wrath...working out His judgment.
And now as we come to chapter 15 we come to the last seven judgments. And this is like a Gatling gun, bang-bang-bang-bang- bang-bang, just happens at the very very end...seven last plagues. And they fill up, verse 1 says, the wrath of God. And you see this tremendous scene in heaven unfolding in chapter 15 and it's getting ready for the final judgment. And verse 8 says the temple is filled with smoke from the glory of God and His power, no man was able to enter the temple till the seven plagues of the seven angels were fulfilled. This is a private thing, God gets all the smoke rolling in heaven and they burst out in chapter 16 and the first bowl is poured out and instantly it says there fell a foul and painful sore upon the men who had the mark of the Beast and upon them who worshiped his image. This is helkos, this is like the beggar who had the sores, they may well refer to some cancerous sores. Immediately after that comes the second bowl poured out, or vial, same as a bowl. And the sea became like the blood of a dead man and every living soul died in the sea, a stinking mess with a surface of dead creatures beyond comprehension. And the third angel poured out his bowl on the rivers and fountains of waters and they became blood. Not a fourth anymore, not a third, but now the whole thing. Devastating judgment, pollution of fresh water.
Down in verses 8 and 9 the fourth bowl is poured out and the sun is so hot that it burns men with fire. It scorches them to death. And instead of repenting they blaspheme the God...the name of God. And then the fifth one, incredible, but after the scorching sun comes darkness and they gnawed their tongues for pain. Why? They couldn't see where they're going, there is no light at all, pitch blackness. And they are susceptible to terrible injury and pain and can find no relief because they can't see where they are. And may I add, by the way, verse 11 blasphemed the God of heaven because of their pains and their sores which takes us all the way back to the beginning and says all these plagues are cumulative...cumulative.
The sixth angel poured out his bowl in the River Euphrates, and now comes the way of the kings of the east, that army we talked about earlier. Conquest by a demon-possessed army. And then Armageddon, the final battle on the plain of Armageddon. I've been there, I've stood on that Plain. Napoleon said it was the finest battle place he had ever seen on the face of the earth. And three unclean spirits like frogs, these are demons of a special nature, come out of the slime of hell itself and out of the mouth of the dragon and the mouth of the Beast and the mouth of the False Prophet...and there, by the way, you have the unholy trinity. They are spirits of demons working miracles. They gather the world to the battle at Armageddon and they don't know it's the great day of God Almighty. And all the world comes to Armageddon to fight. Daniel 11, I think, describes it, the kings of the north come down and sweep through the south. The king of the east comes up, the west gets involved, the kings of the east comes. They're all fighting and this massacre is going on. In the midst of it all out of heave comes Jesus Christ. The seventh bowl is poured out at the end of chapter 16 and there's lightning and thunder. Every island fled away, the mountains were not found and there was hail out of heaven...can you believe this?...they weigh about a hundred pounds each. That's a hundred-pound block of ice. That's the finale.