THINGS WILL GET WORSE BEFORE THEY GET BETTER
Revelation 16:1 Then I heard a loud voice from the temple saying to the seven angels, “Go, pour out the seven bowls of God’s wrath on the earth.”
Close to ⅔ of the people have been killed and with the darkening of the sun, moon and stars due to many large meteors hitting the earth much plant life has died and global winter has caused great famines. While this in itself is terrible news there is more bad news on the way before Jesus finally steps down on the Mount of Olives. People still refuse to humble themselves and repent of their sins seeking forgiveness through Jesus, so now God sends out seven angels to unleash his judgment.
The first angel brings ugly and painful sores on people who have the mark of the beast. While many will associate this with technology, the Christians will recognize it as God’s mark of judgment much like with what he put on Cain for killing his brother Abel. The second angel kills every living thing in the sea.
The third angel makes the rivers and springs as of blood. Now like with the plague of Egypt, the people have to dig wells to have drinking water. The fourth angel enhances the brightness of the sun causing intense heat bringing about fires. Rather than repenting of their sins the people begin to once again curse God. The fifth angel brings God’s judgment directly to the antichrist and his kingdom. Now the sun goes from intense brightness and heat to darkness. With this comes painful sores and terrible agony. But once again people refuse to repent of their sinfulness. The sixth angel now dries up the Euphrates River for the kings of the east that we talked about in 9:15-19. With this demons that have caused miraculous signs through the antichrist and false prophet will go throughout the whole world to bring kings and their armies to battle on the great day of God Almighty. This is often called the battle of Armageddon that takes place in the valley of Megiddo in Northern Israel. With this angel there is also a warning to stay awake and be ready, because the Lord will come as a thief. It will be unexpected even though it has been prophesied. The seventh angel makes a great pronouncement saying, “It is done!” The Lord has withdrawn his hand of trying to get the world to repent. Now all that is left is his wrath. Great flashes of lightning, thunder and a severe earthquake comes upon the earth. There has never been such a bad earthquake on earth since the creation of humanity. Cities collapse and every island and mountain is gone. Huge hail of a hundred pounds begin to fall on people, but once again instead of repenting people curse God. I am sure that the people of the world wonder if the world will continue to exist.
Now one of the seven angels comes to John and tells him that he is about to see two very important things. First there is a what is called a great prostitute. This prostitute sits on many waters. Verse 15 tells us that the waters are peoples, multitudes, nations and languages. She is a home of immigrants. She has affected the entire earth with her pulling people away from God through materialism, greed and sin. This certainly sounds like the United States, and God is about to punish her.
Next we have a woman that sits on a scarlet beast that hates this prostitute and is determined to bring her to ruin and burn her with fire. (this could be a nuclear attack)
The woman sees herself as more righteous and holy than the prostitute. The Arab countries have strong hatred for the United States and has labeled it as the Great Satan. The woman that sits on the scarlet beast is a great city that sits on seven hills. Wikipedia lists 71 cities in the world that is built on 7 hills. I will let you look them up as I did. To narrow the list for us we see that sea captains will see the destruction of the city, it must be a city port. I believe that it could be Istanbul, Turkey.
There are other clues to look for as well:
..It is pure or exclusive (as a desert- few immigrants--possibly mostly Muslim)
..Very rich
..Abominable things
..Adulteries (things that turn people from God) Exports of wood, silk, stone. leather, jewelry, carpets, brass, copper, gold, alabaster & etc
..Killed Christians
..John was surprised
..Sits on a empire that was - is not - will come
..Non-christians will be astonished to see the empire return (Ottoman Empire)
..It is very rich
.. God calls Christians out of the city (1894-1923 Turkey tries to eliminate Christians with genocide of killing 50 million and deporting 6,300,000.
..Sea captain's see the smoke of the destroyed city and they put dust on their heads (this is a common practice in the middle east)
Each of these characteristics can be associated with Istanbul, Turkey. Even today in Turkey,Christians may be tolerated, but certainly not accepted as Islam is their accepted religion. It is common knowledge that Turkey and all Arab countries are antichrist and anti Christian. 18:20 says that heaven will rejoice over the destruction of this city for the way it treated the church.The antichrist and false prophet escape this disaster, but are captured by Jesus at his return and they are thrown alive into the fiery lake of burning sulfur.
This will end the seven years of tribulation with Jesus’ return. Chapter 19 describes how he will come with armies of heaven. He will wage war against the nations and strike them down, but before he comes we see something interesting. 19:7 tells us that the wedding of the Lamb has come, and his bride has made herself ready. Many believe that this is when the rapture takes place. Just before Jesus returns to earth, he will take all Christians to be with him in heaven. Then they along with Jesus will return to rule on earth with him. If we look to Matthew 24:30-31 it certainly gives the appearance of a post tribulations rapture, but as I have said earlier I believe this is the mystery that God wants to be kept a secret. And if God wants it to be a secret, I am not going to say I know better.
Tomorrow I will be finishing up the Book of Revelation with Jesus’ 1,000 year reign on earth, the Great White Throne Judgment, the destruction of the sky and earth, a new sky and earth and eternity with Jesus.
Prayer: Lord Jesus, thank you for your word. While we don’t know when all this will take place, we want to be ready. Please help us so we won’t be found unprepared. We ask this in your holy name.
