THE WRATH OF THE LAMB (REVELATION 6)
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A woman asked John Wesley, “Suppose you knew that you were to die tomorrow night at midnight, how would you spend the time until then?” “Why, just as I intend to spend it. I should preach this evening at Gloucester, and again at five tomorrow morning. After that, I should ride to Tewkesbury, preach in the afternoon, and meet the Society in the evening. I should then repair to the home of my friends who expect to entertain me, converse and pray with my family as usual, retire to my room at ten o’clock, commend myself to my heavenly Father, lie down to rest, and wake up in glory.”
According to Wikipedia, “In the futurist view of Christian eschatology, the Great Tribulation is a relatively short period of time where everyone will experience worldwide hardships, persecution, disasters, famine, war, pain, and suffering, which will affect all of creation, and precede judgment of all when the Second Coming takes place. Some pretribulationists believe that those who choose to follow God will be raptured before the tribulation, and thus escape it. On the other hand, posttribulationists believe Christians who are alive at the time of the Great Tribulation must endure the Great Tribulation and will receive great blessings.
According to dispensationalists who hold the futurist view, the Tribulation is thought to occur before the Second Coming of Jesus and during the End Times. In this view, the Tribulation will last seven prophetic Hebrew years (lasting 360 days each) in all but the Great Tribulation will be the second half of the Tribulation period (see Matt 24:15 and Matt 24:21 showing the Great Tribulation is after the Abomination of Desolation, which marks the midpoint of the Tribulation).” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Tribulation
What is the Great Tribulation? How are we to prepare for the future, especially when we won’t be there? Why is the truth of the future scarier than its fiction?
You Got Invitation - The Warning is Ordered
1 I watched as the Lamb opened the first of the seven seals. Then I heard one of the four living creatures say in a voice like thunder, "Come!" 2 I looked, and there before me was a white horse! Its rider held a bow, and he was given a crown, and he rode out as a conqueror bent on conquest. 3 When the Lamb opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature say, "Come!" 4 Then another horse came out, a fiery red one. Its rider was given power to take peace from the earth and to make men slay each other. To him was given a large sword. 5 When the Lamb opened the third seal, I heard the third living creature say, "Come!" I looked, and there before me was a black horse! Its rider was holding a pair of scales in his hand. 6 Then I heard what sounded like a voice among the four living creatures, saying, "A quart of wheat for a day's wages, and three quarts of barley for a day's wages, and do not damage the oil and the wine!" 7 When the Lamb opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth living creature say, "Come!" 8 I looked, and there before me was a pale horse! Its rider was named Death, and Hades was following close behind him. They were given power over a fourth of the earth to kill by sword, famine and plague, and by the wild beasts of the earth.
The world in the Great Tribulation is much worse that all the disaster movies you can ever imagine. It is a mix and match and more of the top seven disaster movies I found on a website: Twister, The Perfect Storm, Independence Day, The Core, Dante’s Peak, The Day After Tomorrow and Contagion. Poseidon Adventure and Towering Infernos were the disaster movies of my time!
The Great Tribulation is incredible, incomprehensible and inexplicable than ever. Previously the four beasts made their debut in chapter 4 (4:6, 8, 9), the Lamb (5:8, 12, 13) and the seals (5:1, 2, 5, 9) in chapter 5, to be followed by the horses in chapter 6. The four beasts, who were by themselves in chapter 4 (Rev 4:6, 8, 9) and were with the 24 elders in chapter 5 (5:6, 8, 11, 14), now had a command for John: “Come” (v 1, 3, 5, 7). The four-fold imperative is Come (v 1, 3, 5, 7). All the verbs “come” previously is in the first person “I will come” or “I come” (2:5, 6, 3:13) or third person “he comes” (1:7) or “he came” (5;7), but this is the first time the verb “come” is in the imperative form, followed by a different color horse. It is a command, charge and a compliance issue. “Come and see” is repeated four times (vv 1, 3, 5, 7), preceded by the opening of a seal by the Lamb, followed by the announcement each time by a different beast and the appearance of a different color horse. It is mutual, The third rider, with a black horse, is to The fourth rider on a pale horse is to expect. The last kill (apokteino) and the second “slay” (sphazo).
White horse Red horse Black horse Pale horse
A bow, and a crown A great sword A pair of scales/balances
Penny
In order to (HINA) conquer v 2 In order to (HINA) slay “each other” v 4 Do not damage (imperative) the oil and the wine v 6 To kill v 8 (infinitive; purpose clause)
Domination
Lust for Power
Bully Desertion
Love at war
Betrayal Devastation
Lack of resources
Barren Death
Loss of lives
Barbaric
Each horse has its distinction, danger and dread. The purpose (hina) of the first horse, a white horse with a rider bow and sword, is to conquer or overcome (nikao) in Greek. The premier verb is Revelation is not make war (6x) but overcome (17x). Conquer (v 2) is not to make war, but to win the war. It is translated as overcome (Luke 11:22), prevail (Rev 5:5) and got the victory (Rev 15:2).
The rider on the second horse, the red horse with a great sword, is to slay or kill each other. This is more disastrous with bloodshed – from bow to bloodshed, from menace to massacre, from conquest to carnage.
You Got Intercession - The Waiting is Over
9 When he opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain because of the word of God and the testimony they had maintained. 10 They called out in a loud voice, "How long, Sovereign Lord, holy and true, until you judge the inhabitants of the earth and avenge our blood?" 11 Then each of them was given a white robe, and they were told to wait a little longer, until the number of their fellow servants and brothers who were to be killed as they had been was completed.
The first two Sundays in November are the International Day of Prayer (IDOP) for the Persecuted Church. 260 million Christians worldwide face persecution and eight Christians are martyred for their faith each day. There were no evangelical Christians among the Hmong in 1989, the WEA said. But today there are over 175,000, despite “brutal” oppression.
https://www.christianitytoday.com/news/2020/november/pew-christian-muslim-persecution-religion-report-idop.html
Islamic State announced on 8 June, 2017, that it had killed a Chinese man and woman in their mid-twenties in Pakistan's most volatile province, Balochistan, a Pakistani province home to a long-running separatist insurgency and an array of militant and jihadist groups. Meng Lisi and Li Xinheng were in the provincial capital, Quetta, to spread the word of Christianity in the unlikeliest and most dangerous of places in conservative Muslim Pakistan. Hundreds and possibly even thousands of the country's growing cadre of Christian missionaries are along for the ride too.
Meng Lisi, 26, was originally from Hubei while Li Xinheng, 24, was from Hunan. Locals in Jinnah Town, a wealthy area of Quetta where the language centre was based, said the group, while distinctly visible, kept a low profile. They travelled around in rickshaws without security and stayed in a simple hostel in the centre of the city.
"Sometimes I saw them singing and playing guitars," a local garbage collector said. In Kharotabad, a very conservative area in Quetta's west home to Pashtun tribes and Afghan refugees, some of the Chinese women went door-to-door speaking with women about Christianity.
Mr Li's mother thought he was going there to teach Mandarin, but quickly adds that as a Christian she would be "proud" if it was true that he was proselytising there. After armed men masquerading as policemen kidnapped the pair in Quetta on 24 May. When Meng Lisi and Li Xinhen were abducted in Quetta, they were first reported to have been working at a language school run by a South Korean. Two Koreans were detained by Pakistan's Federal Investigation Agency, and another 11 Chinese believed to be part of the missionary group were deported.
A young Chinese Christian couple sent to northern Iraq as missionaries told the South China Morning Post after the Pakistan killings that the incident was a reminder that they needed to be careful and sensitive in their work. But they said they still intended to stay there indefinitely, despite the risks. "I actually feel safer here," 25-year-old Michael said, referring to the repression faced by underground churches in China.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-41116480
The word of interest in this next section is “slain” (sphazo, 5:6, 9, 12, 6:4, 9, 13:3, 8, 18:24), which occurs only ten times in the Bible and one time only outside of Revelation, describing Cain who slew his brother (1 John 3:12). It is translated elsewhere as slew (1 John 3:12), kill (Rev 6:4) and wounded (Rev 13:3), and it is not a word used lightly because it’s an unkind, unfeeling and unbrotherly word. Vines says it means “to butcher (especially an animal for food or in sacrifice) or (generally) to slaughter, or (specifically) to maim (violently).” Those who were slain in Revelation include the Lamb (Rev 5:6, 9, 12, 13:3, 8), “one another” in the Great Tribulation (6:4) and finally, slain believers from the souls of those who had been slain, their fellow servants and brothers fellow servants and brothers (6:9, 11) to the blood of prophets and of the saints, and of all who have been killed on the earth (Rev 18:24). They were slayed, slaughtered and sacrificed for two reasons: for the word of God and the testimony (v 9), the same reason for John’s exile (Rev 1:2, 9). The first is the word and the second is the witness. One is the text and the other is the teaching.
The focus, however, is not on the word or witness, but the wailing – “cry with a loud voice,” a mix of sobbing, screaming, shrieking, which occurs repeatedly in the book (Rev 6:10, 7:2, 10, 10:3, 19:17), more than any book.
Verse 10 is the second question in Revelation (“How long, Sovereign Lord, holy and true, until you judge the inhabitants of the earth and avenge our blood?"), after the first one in Revelation 5:2. “How long?” Wait (v 11) is more than “wait” in Greek; it is translated as rest (Matt 11:28), take your ease (Luke 12:19) and refreshed (1 Cor 16:18). The” word of God” plus “the testimony” combo is exclusive to Revelation (Rev 1:2, 1:9, 6:9).
Judge (v 10) is justice not judgment. Avenge is a seldom used word in the Bible, translated as revenge (2 Cor 10:6), famously used twice for the widow who troubled a judge (Luke 18:3, 5) by her pleas. Biblical avenge is not emotional; it is fairness as it comes from the word “ek-dikeo,” or out-(do) right, with right as a verb. White robe (v 11) occurs only one time for an angel (Mark 16:5) at Jesus’ resurrection. Judge is before, avenge is after.
Whatever period it is, there is no rest for fellow servants and brothers (v 11) who were predicted to be killed. More than ever, more than usual, more and more believers will suffer slaughter – they will be massacred, mutilated and murdered in the most hideous, humiliating, harshest, horrific, hateful manner possible.
You Got Insurance - The Wrath is Outpoured
12 I watched as he opened the sixth seal. There was a great earthquake. The sun turned black like sackcloth made of goat hair, the whole moon turned blood red, 13 and the stars in the sky fell to earth, as late figs drop from a fig tree when shaken by a strong wind. 14 The sky receded like a scroll, rolling up, and every mountain and island was removed from its place. 15 Then the kings of the earth, the princes, the generals, the rich, the mighty, and every slave and every free man hid in caves and among the rocks of the mountains. 16 They called to the mountains and the rocks, "Fall on us and hide us from the face of him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb! 17 For the great day of their wrath has come, and who can stand?"
The first Christian movie I saw when I accepted Christ in 1979 was the classic 1972 Christian movie “A Thief in the Night.” The film is about a young woman, Patty Meyers, who was not raptured and who struggles to decide what to do in the face of the Tribulation. Patty wakes up to a radio broadcast announcing the Rapture, with the disappearance of millions around the world. She finds that her husband has also disappeared. The United Nations sets up an emergency government system called UNITE) and declares anyone who does not receive the Mark of the Beast identifying them with UNITE will be arrested.
Several flashbacks occur to times in Patty's life before the rapture. Patty considers herself a Christian because she occasionally reads her Bible and goes to church regularly. However, her pastor is shown to be an unbeliever. She refuses to believe the warnings of her friends and family that she will go through the Great Tribulation if she does not put her faith in Christ. Meanwhile, her husband, who has been attending another church, has accepted Jesus. The next morning, Patty wakes to find that her husband and millions of others have suddenly disappeared.
Patty is conflicted and refuses to trust Christ yet also refuses to take the mark. She desperately tries to avoid UNITE and the mark but is eventually captured. Patty escapes, but after a chase she is cornered by UNITE on a bridge and falls from the bridge to her death. Patty wakes up and realizes it has all been a dream. She is relieved, but her relief is short-lived when the radio announces that millions of people have in fact disappeared. Horrified, Patty frantically searches for her husband only to find he is missing too. Patty realizes that the Rapture has actually occurred and she has been left behind.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Thief_in_the_Night_(film)
V 12 great earthquake
The Big One Sounded
V 12 sun became black “as” sackcloth of hair Shaded
V 12 the moon “as” blood Stained
V 13 And the stars of heaven fell unto the earth “as” a fig tree casteth her untimely figs, when she is shaken of a mighty wind. Shaken
V 14 And the heaven departed “as” a scroll when it is rolled together Scrolled
V 14 every mountain and island were moved out of their places. Shifted
Hide (v 15) is a common verb, but this is the first and only time the pronoun “themselves” is added. It is a natural instinct of fear. Caves and rocks are different in that caves are indoors and rocks are outdoor. Mountains, on the other hand, are big rocks. In their panic the victims said in a desperate and deafening imperative form, ‘Fall’ on us and ‘hide’ us! The truth is there is no cave, rock or mountain big enough,
Why? They want to hide from the face and wrath of the Lamb, more than any physical dangers. Wrath occurs for the first time in the book. Face is the shame and the wrath is the sentence. From my research, I was surprised to discover that while “wrath” (orge) occurs 36 times in the Bible, there are merely a few references to the references directly related to “the wrath of God” - only three, one to the who do not believe in the Son ( John 3:36), the wrath of God against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men (Rom 1:18) and two other passages to the children of disobedience, stopping at Colossians (Eph 5:6, Col 3:6). The phrase “the wrath of God” is lost to reappear as “the wrath of the Lamb” (Rev 6:16) and wrath of Almighty God (Rev 19:15). Every occurrence of the six times it appears refer specifically to God:
“the wrath of the Lamb!” (Rev 6:16-17)
“great day of his wrath” (6:17 KJV)
“your wrath has come” (Rev 11:18)
“the cup of his wrath” (Rev 14:10)
“the fury of his wrath” (Rev 16:19)
“the fury of the wrath of God Almighty” (Rev 19:15)
Three are only three “great day” references in the Bible, all referring to the future – the great day (Jude 6), the judgment of the great day (Rev 6:17) and the great day of God Almighty (Rev 16:14).
There is no wrath like the wrath of God, hotter than the fire intensified seven times as ordered by Nebuchadnezzar for Daniel’s three friends ( Dan 3:19-20).
Stand (v 17) in the Bible means escape, endure, and end. God’s wrath is poured out, not delayed, deferred or decreased. No sigh is longer, no scream is louder and no sobbing is least. It will all-out mayhem, misery and misfortune never before seen. It is not just panic but pandemonium, not just chaos but catastrophe, not just turmoil but tragedy, not just major disaster but human disaster. Wrath is extreme, excessive and explosive anger. It is furious, frenzied and fiery - ever-growing, ever-increasing, everlasting, ever-worsening and evermore, till His enemies are defenceless, debilitated and destroyed. The end is humbling, harmed and handicapped.
Conclusion: What would we do differently if Jesus were coming back tomorrow? If Jesus were coming back in a year, 6 months, or tomorrow, how would that change how we spend our time, money, and energy? Some try to live by the following guideline: “Live as if Jesus were coming in the next 10 minutes. Plan as if he were not coming for another thousand years.” Start living today as if Jesus were coming this afternoon. Fill your home with songs of praise and thanksgiving.
