Verses 9 – 12 of Rev. 14 are the picture of the anger and wrath of God against the ungodly and evil of this world. Those who don’t repent and turn to God in the end time will have the wrath of God fall upon them. The assurance is that justice will triumph. But it will triumph at the expense of the ungodly.
Read verses 9-11. The judgment of God is going to fall on all who follow the beast and receive the mark of the beast. Remember that those with the mark are those that show their first loyalty to the state and to the antichrist instead of God.
This belief runs through society today. There are many who believe that man can control his own destiny, that what is really important is good government, good education, good medicine, good social services, and on and on. But these things are not everlasting.
We see the judgment in verse 10-11. Four things are said about the judgment of God.
1. The ungodly and evil will drink the fury and wrath of God. We know that God must keep heaven perfect. When He creates the new heavens and earth, He has to exclude and shut out all those who have cursed and denied Him. All those who rejected Him. All those who are His enemies. All those who don’t want His control and restraint on their lives.
Remember, too, that God has given man every chance. He has done everything that can be done to reach out and save man. But man continues to reject and deny, and even curse His Son. We can’t forget that God is not only love, but He is also just. Just as His love has to be perfectly demonstrated toward man, so His justice has to be perfectly demonstrated. But when that day comes, He has to be just and exclude all the ungodly and evil. If He were not just, then the new heavens and earth would be corrupted by the ungodly and evil. So the ungodly will drink the cup of God’s fury.
2. The second thing said about the judgment of God is that the ungodly and evil will be tormented with fire and burning sulfur. Fire and sulfur is the picture of the hot flaming molten lava that flows from the mouth of a volcano that has erupted. It’s a terrible thought to think that a person would choose to spend eternity suffering as though he was caught in the bed of fire and burning sulfur.
Today, right now, is the day of God’s love and grace. We must heed the warning of fire and burning sulfur and repent and turn to God.
3. The third thing said about the judgment is that the ungodly and evil will be tormented in the presence of the holy angels and Christ. Christ is the one who will give the order to cast unbelievers into hell and the holy angels will carry out the orders. Christ will be there and every eye of all unbelievers will see Him. On that day, all the unbelievers who have done all the terrible things against Christ will all know that He is exactly who He claimed to be.
4. The fourth thing said about the judgment is that the ungodly and evil will be tormented forever and ever. The picture is that of duration, of how long a person will have to stay in hell amidst all the agony and misery. The picture of wrenching and twisting in pain and suffering, of never being relieved, of never having peace or rest, not even for a single night or day.
There is no peace in hell. There is no rest in hell. It will last forever and ever. A great day of separating is coming, a day when all those who believe in Jesus will be separated from those who have denied Christ. The unbeliever is not going to live in the same world that the believer will live in. Hell is everlasting punishment. READ verse 12.
This verse explains that there is some who will escape the judgment of God. Three things are said about the one who escapes.
1. He is a saint who endures. Saint means set apart unto God. This person has separated himself from the world and set his life apart unto God. Those who endure, who set their lives apart unto God, only those will escape the coming judgment.
2. The one who escapes will obey God’s commandments. He believes God and he loves God so he obeys God. He refuses to accept the mark of the beast, and he follows God so he will escape the coming judgment.
3. He remains faithful to Jesus. He has dedicated his life to follow Jesus Christ so he will escape the coming judgment of God.
We are given the 5th assurance in verse 13. The dead will be at rest and rewarded. Read verse 13. The day is coming when we will no longer exist here on earth. We will be gone forever. Believers know this. This is the very reason they are willing to separate themselves from the world and to live for Christ.
The verse says blessed are the dead who die in the Lord. What does it mean to die in the Lord? It means that a person lived in the Lord when he was on earth. He believed in the Lord Jesus and followed after the Lord with all his heart and life. When he faced death, he was in the Lord, he died being in the Lord.
Two great rewards are mentioned for those who die in the Lord.
1. There is the reward of rest from earthly labor. The picture is that of work, strenuous work and exhausting labor will cease. No more being under pressure. No more being tense.
For those who are in the Lord, the Lord takes him home to heaven and gives him rest from his labor and toil. Oh Jesus come quickly.
2. Then there is the reward of heavenly work to do. Heaven is not going to be inactivity like so many people think. It won’t be floating around on a fluffy cloud playing a harp. It won’t be standing around singing the praises of God all the time.
Heaven is going to be full of both worship and service. But when we work and serve Christ in the new heavens and earth, we will never tire not become exhausted. We will be able to work and serve Christ forever without ever feeling pressure, tension, headaches, or sleepy. Believers are to be made kings and priest in heaven. We are going to rule and reign with Christ, under His direction.
The sixth assurance is seen in verses 14-16. The glorious harvest of the Godly will take place. READ verse 14. We see here the harvester, Jesus Christ.
Jesus returns in a white cloud. White symbolizes the purity of heaven. He will be wearing a gold crown. Gold symbolizes value and preciousness. The crown symbolizes royalty, rule, dominion, and sovereignty. Jesus Christ is coming to take His rightful place in the world.
3. Jesus Christ shall return with a sharp sickle in His hand. The sickle is a sharp tool with a long knife-like edge used to harvest the grain of the field. This is the picture of judgment. He will be returning to judge the world.
READ vv. 15-16. Now we see the harvest of the earth, the separation of believers from the ungodly and evil of the earth. There is Jesus hovering over the earth with a sickle in His hand, and in a moment’s time every eye sees Him. The sight is wonderful and glorious to believers, because it means that the great day of their redemption has come. But it means fear and horror to unbelievers, because it means that the great day of God’s wrath has come to fall on them.
Two things we need to note.
1. The harvest of the earth will be ripe. Another angel comes out of the temple of God, out of heaven. He shouts, “Take your sickle and reap!” This reference is to Jesus Christ. It’s time for Him to harvest those who belong to Him.
2. Jesus swings His sickle over the earth and the earth is harvested. The believers are harvested, they are taken out of the world and away from its ungodliness and evil. They are harvested to be with Christ forever and ever.
Never again will the believer suffer a single tear. All believers will be joined together in heaven. But in verses 17-20 we see the last of seven assurances: the terrible harvest of the ungodly will take place. The day will come when the judgment will come. READ verse 17.
We see the harvester, a great angel. He comes out of the temple of God. He holds a sharp sickle in his hand. Read 18-19. Then we see the terror of the harvest of the ungodly.
First there will be the terror of the angelic cry. This is a second angel, but he doesn’t come from God’s presence. He comes from the altar of incense. Remember that the altar is where the prayers of God’s people are kept, and where the martyred saints of Christ are stationed in heaven.
Jesus Christ is now ready to rid the world of all the ungodly and evil. The angel has the power of fire. That means that the fire of God’s judgment is to be cast upon the earth and all unbelievers are to be consumed. The angel cries out for judgment to begin. The ungodly are said to be clustered like grapes hanging on the vine of the earth. There are two vines in the earth: the vine of Jesus Christ and the vine of the world.
Jesus said that He is the vine and His followers are the branches. This passage also says that the earth has a vine—a vine of worldliness and ungodliness—a vine that will reach its full growth in the end time in the antichrist and his followers.
A person chooses on which vine he will hang. He chooses which cluster of grapes he wishes to be a part, the followers of Jesus Christ or the followers of the antichrist.
Then there is the time of God’s wrath. The angel lifts his sickle high into the air and with the swift stroke of God’s power, he swings the sickle of eternal judgment into the earth. The vine of the earth is cut. All the ungodly are cut down and gathered together, and cast together into the winepress of God’s wrath.
The winepress was a trough usually made out of either stone or brick that was placed over a large vat. The grapes were placed in the trough and people would trample the grapes and the juice would flow through holes in the bottom of the trough into the vat.
The trampling of the grapes was deliberate. There was no love, no compassion, no mercy on the grapes. This is the picture of God’s wrath and the unbelievers.
Read v. 20. We see the terror of Armageddon, the place where the wrath of God is to fall. Note two things here and then we will stop.
1. The winepress of God’s judgment is trampled down outside the city. The city always refers to Jerusalem. This is a picture of the armed forces of the world gathering outside Jerusalem under the leadership of the antichrist. They think they are strong. While there, the midnight hour of judgment strikes. The time for God’s wrath to fall comes and the quickest defeat in human history occurs against the greatest army ever amassed by man. The antichrist and his armies are destroyed.
2. Note what the horrifying scene will look like. Blood will flow out of the winepress of God’s wrath and the blood will be as deep as two feet in some places. The distance that the blood will flow is said to be about 184 (200) miles—about the length of Palestine. This is thorough judgment.
All this has already been pictured throughout the Bible.
Isaiah 63: 1-6; Joel 3: 9-17; Later in Revelation 19: 13-21; 2 Thessalonians 2: 8-12
So we have seen the future. We are given 7 assurances.
1. The redeemed will be with Jesus.
2. The Gospel will be preached to the whole world.
3. Babylon, the Godless State and religion, will fall.
4. Justice will be executed.
5. The dead will be at rest and rewarded.
6. The glorious harvest of the godly will take place.
7. The terrible harvest of the ungodly will take place.
All these we will see in the following chapters.
