Commercial Babylon Under Fire

COMMERCIAL BABYLON UNDER FIRE

Revelation 18

The last chapter shows the awful ending of the satanic religious system that we refer to as “The Great Harlot”. Now we will be observing the fall of the same system, but in a different facet. The political, the commercial, and the religious are so very tightly intertwined that they must be dissected individually. The tentacles of each are wrapping each other so tightly that they seem as one. The political and the religious have long been recognized as being together, but not as closely recognized, as being together, are the religious and the commercial. This chapter will show how devastating it will be to the world when the commercial program of Satan is completely destroyed and it will be. That is what this chapter is about.

I. THE JUDGMENT OF BABYLON IS DECLARED. (Vv. 1-8)

A very impressive announcement is about to be made concerning the fall of Babylon the great. The heavens will be brightened by the angel’s glory. The glory of God is being transferred by the mighty angel to the earth. This brightness will be seen upon the earth. This is to be such an impressive event that it will be attended to in a most impressive way. The glory of God rested upon Moses as he came out of the mount with the tables of the law still in his hand. This same glory of God is apparently what is being described here when the angel makes the announcement concerning the fall of Babylon. With this announcement we will learn in greater detail concerning her wickedness.

A. She Was Wicked. (Vv. 1-3)

There is no where in the Scriptures that you can recognize the presence of Satan any more than when Babylon the great had fallen. Notice how this brief portion of Scripture describes the wicked environment immediately after Babylon’s fall, “Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and is become the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird”. In my minds eye, I can see how the traumatic force of God’s judgment has left its indelible mark on commercial Babylon. Can you smell with me the ruin of such a total judgment; do you smell the awful smell of sulfur and the more awful smell of death as the buzzard like birds are perched on the shredded carnage that remains? The green, misty vapor settles like a damp fog with the glimmer and the glitter of such a proud city forever gone. Her bright lights, along with her tensile flickering thoroughfares will be seen no more; for judgment has fallen! Only the smell of death remains and that smell can be only described as a suffocating smell unlike any smelled before.

No matter how impressive the interchanging of ideas may have been when the business entrepreneurs would gather in their closed coffers; it will no longer be so. The Wall Street mentality is forever gone… For the proud business owners who may have survived, they now see only the shredded remains of their empire lying in the smoldering ruins with only a charred sign to remind them of what was once a part of commercial Babylon. Countless souls will be seen sobbing and weeping knowing that all of their dreams were flawed. They had been deceived by the Great Harlot into thinking that they were invincible and that their empires would last forever. They now can only see failure. Instead of seeing a beautiful enticing harlot, as she once appeared, they see her as the burnt out, despicable creature that she always was. Her perfume now is repulsive; her breath is to be avoided, for she has the foul smell of death all about her. For Babylon the great has been judged.

B. Saints Were Warned. (Vv. 4-8)

It is very easy for me to become confused with the chronology of all that is happening in Revelation, but one thing that I am not confused about is that the Lord is constantly doing all that He can to warn the wicked to come out of their wicked system. God is giving such warning in regards to this Babylonian system. For those of us who now live, we may rest assured that as believers that we will not be called upon to go through the Great Tribulation of sorrow. We may also know that the lost person has a present day opportunity of coming to the Lord to avoid any chance of having to go through tribulation.

The Lord is mercifully warning us that the sins of this wicked system called Commercial Babylon has reached up to heaven. I personally think that there is more to this than a statement of His omniscience. I believe that it is referring to those who died and went to heaven that were under the oppression and the martyrdom of this system. The greed and the murder that she was capable of caused many a poor soul to die prematurely. This is a passage that says that God not only knows about the persecution that fell upon the believers for refusing to take the mark, but that He is also going to do something about it. In verse number six, we are told, “Reward her even as she rewarded you, and double unto her double according to her works: in the cup which she hath filled fill to her double.”