We're going to turn to Revelation 14, and the title of the message is, A Sneak Peek at Last Things. A Sneak Peek at Last Things from Revelation 14. And it's hard to believe that we're already in this 14th chapter of Revelation. And we know that most of the book of Revelation is about the period of time that we call the Tribulation. And the Tribulation Period was revealed to John, one of Jesus' 12 disciples, at a much later time in his life just before he died actually, he was in his nineties, we believe, when he got this vision that was written down and made its way into our Bible called the book of Revelation. And most of this book is about the Tribulation which was revealed in a series of signs, primarily three sets of seven. There were seven wax seals that bound the scroll shut and Jesus breaks each of those seven seals. And with the breaking of the seventh, there commences the second set of seven, which is the sounding of seven trumpets. And then after the seventh trumpet, that final set of seven, which are seven bowls, like bowls that you put water or cereal in, is the only way I could compare it, in which God takes His wrath in each of those bowls and pours that bowl out from heaven down to the earth, bringing the consummation of His judgment to rebellious mankind. After the seventh trumpet, we moved into the 12th chapter. And we saw in the 12th chapter the plot of the Tribulation revealed in a broad context. There were once again signs of a woman who was giving birth, and of a dragon who hated the woman and wanted to kill the child to whom she gave birth. And we understood that the woman was Israel, the child whom she gave birth is Jesus, and Satan hates Israel and Satan hates Jesus. And although Satan would persecute the woman, God would protect the woman who was indeed Israel. And it was a panoramic view of this idea of God's plan for Israel to bring into the world a Redeemer, a Savior, a Messiah, and of Satan's final attempts, feudal though they are, to completely exterminate Israel just before Christ comes and defeats his efforts. So that was chapter 12, a lot in that chapter. And then we looked at chapter 13, where from the plot we looked at the expanded cast of characters that Satan will use, starting with himself at the top of the list, but then he will take possession of an earthly leader who was revealed through the image of a beast, and we know he's a human, even though he was revealed to John as a beast, he's called the Antichrist. And then we saw another beast who represents an agent of the Antichrist for religious and economic purposes called the false prophet. So we have this plot of Satan hating Israel, Satan hating Jesus, and Satan doing all that he can the later the time gets to defeat the purposes for the revealing of Christ, and for the role Israel has been promised she will play in God's kingdom. And then chapter 13 says, Satan will be on the loose, especially during the last half of the Tribulation, his human representative, the Antichrist, will be the token person in charge of a global kingdom inspired by the devil, and then the false prophet. Now we pivot into chapter 14. And what we see is if you just wanna summarize chapter 14, Christ prevails, Christ prevails. Now this chapter, being a part of 12, 13, and 14, remember, we've heard the seventh trumpet sound, and so this three-chapter section is between the seventh trumpet and the first bowl. And what I want to explain to you is that as it forms this section, it does not fit into the chronology that we see depicted in the seven seals, in the seven trumpets, and the seven bowls. In fact, this is especially true in these first five verses of chapter 14, where it shows us that the picture John sees, the 144,000 who had been sealed earlier in the Tribulation, 12,000 from each of the tribes of Israel, who are standing on Mount Zion having been united with Christ once He returns to the earth. So you see what I'm saying? It doesn't fit into the chronology because Christ doesn't return in the narrative of the book of Revelation until the 19th chapter, we're just in the 14th chapter. But that's why the title of the message is, it's a sneak peek. God gives John a fast-forward view, where He elevates him above the seven bowls that are remaining, and He gives him a set of binoculars and he sees Christ already having returned, and Christ is united with these 144,000 faithful Jewish believers who have preached the gospel throughout the Tribulation Period. So after chapter 14, the binoculars will be taken away, and then John will resume describing the outpouring of wrath through seven bowls. But I just wanted you to understand, don't get confused, that just because chapter 14 reveals Christ as already having come to Mount Zion, which is Jerusalem, that somehow this means we're already there in the narrative of Revelation, no, it's just a sneak peek, that's all it is. It's part of a parentheses, it's part of a little interlude between the trumpets and the bowls. So I want us to look in verse one, where John writes, "Then I looked, and behold, a Lamb standing on Mount Zion..." And that means Jerusalem. "And with the Lamb, who is Jesus, there were 144,000 having His Father's name written on their foreheads." So here he is seeing Christ already having returned. And this is the moment before Christ establishes His earthly kingdom. So it's the most crucial transition in the whole book, Christ having returned, and Christ about to run the flag of His dominion up the flagpole of the Holy City that is called in Scripture, Mount Zion. Now, what I wanna explain to you is that the King James version and the New King James versions are translated from what is called the majority text, which means that when those Bible translations were translated from Hebrew and Greek into English, it was based upon the largest number of existing manuscripts. But since that time, there have been other biblical manuscripts that are dated earlier than the majority of manuscripts. And it is based on these findings of earlier manuscripts that some of our more modern translations are based, including the New American Standard. So when we were reading in the New King James version a moment ago, and that's the version I typically use, but you'll find me sometimes referring to the New American Standard, which is the standard of the version of Scripture out of which Dr. Stanley has preached for many years because it is the most literal word for word translation, or was for years, and there are a few that are comparable to it now, it was based on the earliest manuscripts and not just the King James, it was based on the broadest number and the largest number of manuscripts, but you'll hear me sometimes quote from the NASB. Sometimes I'll quote from the New Living Translation just because it's more conversational, not because it's more literal. So in this instance, when I read to you verse one from the New King James it says these 144,000 who were standing in Jerusalem with the Lord Jesus, who is the Lamb, they have their Father's name written on their heads. But based on earlier manuscripts, the New American really gives us an elaboration on that. And I wanna display it on the screen for you. Verse one from the New American Standard Bible is, "Then I looked, and behold, the Lamb was standing on Mount Zion, and with Him 144,000 who had His name." That is in the earliest manuscripts. "Who had His name, which is the Lamb's name, that's Jesus, and the name of His Father written on their foreheads." And so it's interesting just to see how the elaboration of, they didn't just have the Father God's name on them, these 144,000, they have the name of the Lamb written on them, who is the Lord Jesus Christ. There is a famous Lutheran evangelical theologian whose name was Joseph Seiss, who wrote a very extensive commentary on Revelation. And Reverend Seiss made this observation that because they have the name of their Father written on them, this reveals their Jewish identity as being children of the covenant made between Jehovah and Israel. But because they have the name of the Son written on them, this reveals that all though Jewish, they have trusted in the Lord Jesus Christ during the Tribulation Period. And therefore, we know these 144,000, they bear the name of Jehovah God, the Father of Jesus, but they also bear the name of Jesus. So this means that these 144,000 are what we would call Messianic Jews. They are Jews who placed their faith in their Messiah, who is the Lord Jesus Christ. Now this is not the first time that we see the 144,000 in the book of Revelation, we actually were introduced to them in chapter seven. And just going back to chapter seven in verse three, "John is said to have heard an angel from the east saying, 'Do not harm the earth, the sea, or the trees till we have sealed the servants of our God on their foreheads.' And I heard the number of those who were sealed. 144,000 of all the tribes of the children of Israel, and they were sealed." So going back to when we first saw these 144,000 earlier in the Tribulation, John says that they were marked or they were sealed. And what we see here is we understand the significance of their having been sealed. It was not just a seal of ownership. Oh, no, it was a seal of preservation, because when we see this sneak peek in chapter 14 with the binoculars, looking over the seven bowls which still have to be poured out, John is getting a sneak peek at Christ already having returned. Who is standing with Christ but these 144,000? And what this proves to us is that the seal that was placed on them back in chapter seven was the seal whereby they were preserved from being murdered, or as we would say, martyred for their faith in Christ. It means that these 144,000 Messianic believers, who have been preaching Christ through the Tribulation, they have survived the seven-year Tribulation, and they have especially survived the last three and a half of the seven years, which we call the Great Tribulation. All the attempts that the Antichrist and his global system will have made to extinguish them, they have overcome, they have prevailed, they have survived, and they have lived long enough to see him and his global army consumed by the wrath of Christ when He returns. And here they stand because they had been sealed by God, they stand on Mount Zion in the city of Jerusalem welcoming their Messiah to His capital city from which He will now reign for 1,000 years. We read in verse two, where John hears music from heaven, and harps playing, and voices singing. And John tells us that although the song being sung was in heaven, that he could hear, the only people on earth who could learn that heavenly song were these 144,000 standing in Jerusalem with Christ at the beginning of the Millennial Reign. Isn't it interesting that they're the only ones on earth who can learn this heavenly song, and what I have to believe is that this song that only they can sing is a song that celebrates the fulfillment of that model prayer which Jesus taught His disciples in the Sermon on the Mount, we call it the Lord's Prayer. You remember how it goes? "Our Father, who is in heaven, Hallowed be Your name." And then look what the next verse says, "Your kingdom come, Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven." And this is what I want you to understand, that for the first time since Adam and Eve were in the Garden of Eden before sin, this will be the fulfillment of the Lord's Prayer that His kingdom will have come, and now His will will be done on earth as it is in heaven, because the fulfillment of the Lord's Prayer is the Millennial Reign of Jesus Christ. And these 144,000, they are the symbolic representation of God answering that prayer request, because Christ is now establishing His kingdom in this sneak peek we have. And when we read about them, we can describe them using words that start with the letter P, they are protected, which means they survived all of the attempts to kill them that were perpetrated against them by the Antichrist and his world system. Not only were they protected, but they were pure. We read in verses four and five that they did not defile themselves with sexual immorality, but they exercised chastity. They were pure and holy in their moral conduct. And it also says in verse number five that there was no deception in their character or in their words. It's the word from which we get the word pseudo, which means false. There was no falsehood spoken by them. So these 144,000, they were pure in word and in deed, they were a holy and godly Messianic Jews. But not only that, they were prominent. Because it tells us in verse number four that they followed the Lamb wherever He went. So they are part of this regal administration of the King having returned, the Messiah having returned to the earth. They're prominent because they're following Jesus everywhere He goes during His Millennial Reign. So it's fascinating to think about what all this means. In verse four they're called the first fruits to God and to the Lamb. And I love that word first fruits, it has rich biblical significance. Why would they be called the first fruits? Because they stand as human testimonies of God's final fulfillment of all of the outstanding promises God made to Israel which were part of His covenants to them. We've talked about this many times, that the reason we believe that God still has a plan for Israel is because when you go back and look at the Old Testament covenants God made with them, there are still so many unchecked boxes, so many outstanding promises that are unfulfilled. Christ did not fulfill all of those promises that God made to Israel when Jesus came the first time, but He will fulfill all the outstanding promises when He comes the second time, which means when Jesus returns to the earth every remaining unchecked box in the list of God's promises to His covenant people, Israel, will all be checked off. Can I get a witness out there? So being the first fruits, these 144,000, represent the transition of the kingdom being completely restored back to Israel through Christ's return to the earth, and they are the first ones to enter into that fulfilled promise. As those who had been sealed at the beginning of the Tribulation, share their faith faithfully through the Tribulation, and who had been protected to persevere through even the worst and most climactic part of the Tribulation, and now they've crossed the threshold having been eye witnesses of the return of Christ. And now He is establishing His headquarters in Israel from which He will rule over all the earth, and they constitute, is a visible representation, they are the first fruits of that kingdom baton being handed back to Israel. Oh, I'm telling you, this is very powerful truth. And the late Dr. John Walvoord, whose interpretation of Revelation I rely on heavily, he wrote this, "The 144,000 are the godly nucleus of Israel which is the token of the redemption of the nation and the glory of Israel which is is to unfold in the kingdom." Now I've read a lot of commentaries describing, and interpreting, and explaining these 144,000, but I've never seen it stated so beautifully, so succinctly as did Dr. Walvoord there in the quote I just showed you. So now we move from this triumphant vision John sees through his sneak peek, a look through the binoculars, to the end when Christ has returned, and the 144,000 have been protected to enter into the millennium under Christ's reign. Now John shifts and describes in verses six through 12 the Revelation of three angels, three different angels, each of whom has a specific proclamation to share. So what I want to do is I just want to give an overview of each one of these angelic proclamations made by each of the three, all right? So one angel proclaims the everlasting gospel. And you can write that down or you can simply look there in verses six and seven, and you can see exactly what I'm talking about. Now when you think of the everlasting gospel, what I usually think about, I'm not sure if you think of it this way, but I usually think about the death, the burial, and the resurrection of Jesus as being the gospel. And that is the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. But here, the angel is said to be proclaiming the everlasting gospel, which means that it is not necessarily the proclamation of the death, burial, and resurrection, and an invitation to be saved, oh no. To the contrary, this is simply a proclamation to fear God and give Him glory because the angel proclaims that the time of His judgment is at hand. So it is an everlasting gospel, which means that from the time that God created us, God has always known that there would be a time of judgment against a creation that was made with free will. And this everlasting gospel is going to be proclaimed as a warning that the end is near. So it is all a symbol that this one angel of the three is pronouncing an everlasting message that you need to acknowledge God and give glory to God because He is about to put the womp on everybody on planet earth. But here is another angel. "Another angel proclaims the downfall of Babylon." And we find that in verse eight. And we'll look at that in just a moment. But isn't it interesting to think that here in the last days, in the final days of the Tribulation there will be an angel, or at least it was signified this way, an angel crying out that Babylon will be destroyed. This reference to Babylon by this second angel, it takes us back to the Babylon of the sixth century before Christ, the Babylon of King Nebuchadnezzar, which if you studied the book of Daniel, you know full well who Nebuchadnezzar was. Nebuchadnezzar was this ungodly savage king of the Babylonians, who began invading the Holy Land and stripping the Jewish people from Israel, and taking them as captives, or as we call them, exiles, into his kingdom. From their homeland into Babylon, they became his exiles in subservience to the pagan Babylonian people. Of course, these deportations culminated in 586 BC when he entered Jerusalem with his armies and completely destroyed the holy city, took all of the sacred furnishings from the temple, looted the temple before destroying the very house of Almighty God. And from that day, until even now, Babylon to Jewish people who know their Bibles, Babylon is a euphemism for all things satanic and evil. And of course, what you and I know 'cause we've studied this is that the Babylon of Nebuchadnezzar was located geographically in the same part of the world, where the tower of Babel was constructed in the book of Genesis. And what happened at the tower of Babel is when mankind came together, and decided we're going to build a tower which was really like a high place for a temple to worship. And what man was doing at the tower of Babel was enthroning mankind in the place of God. So you have Babel in Genesis where God scattered them with judgment over their language, and then you have Babylon of the sixth century that became euphemistic for Satan and evil because of what Babylon did to the Jewish people. And then we also know that first and second century Christians actually referred to the Roman empire as Babylon, because of the emperor's cruel treatment of Christians. So here we are in Revelation, and this second angel in chapter 14 is proclaiming the downfall of Babylon. And that means that Babylon, is not referring to the tower of Babel, it's not referring to the Babylonian emperor, Nebuchadnezzar, from the time before Christ, no, and it is not even referring to the ancient Roman Empire that persecuted our Christian forebears in the first and second centuries of Christian history. This Babylon is being used to refer to the revived Roman empire, which is the kingdom of the Antichrist. So Babylon is the title that is being used to describe this global kingdom under the rule of the Antichrist in the last days. So when you think about it, the tower of Babel was mankind making himself into God, Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon was a foreshadowing of the future world leader who would also wield his power against Israel like Nebuchadnezzar did. And now the Antichrist is being described as Babylon, along with his kingdom by this second angel. Now I want you to read specifically what the angel says about Babylon. In verse eight, John tells us, "This other angel followed saying, 'Babylon is fallen, is fallen.'" You see how "is fallen" is repeated there, stated twice. Now I believe for it to say Babylon is fallen, is fallen, that this is to convey this sense of finality. In case you missed the first is fallen, lemme repeat it, oh yeah, Babylon is fallen, she done, she over, she washed up. Babylon is fallen, is fallen. But let me tell you another way to see it, Babylon being understood as fallen in a comprehensive way, by being stated twice, remember in chapter 13 we saw that the Antichrist kingdom is going to have a political component and a religious component. And the political component of the Antichrist kingdom can be called Babylon, it is Babylonian power through government. The religious component can also be referred to as a spiritual Babylon. It is the Babylon of indoctrination that forces people to worship a false God. So could it be that this chart helps us to interpret why there are two "is fallens" in that verse. That the first "is fallen" refers to Babylon, the political empire of Antichrist, and the second "is fallen" refers to Babylon, the religious empire of the Antichrist. Well, that certainly makes perfect sense to me when you compare it with what we saw about the two components of his kingdom in the end. Now let's look at this, and remember, the first angel in chapter 14, proclaims the everlasting gospel, which is a judgment of imminent doom, a warning of imminent doom. The second is this pronouncement that the Babylonian Empire, a figurative expression of the Antichrist and his kingdom, is fallen, is fallen. Now let's talk about the third angel. "A third angel proclaims eternal damnation." And this is described for us by John in verses nine through 12. Now you would agree with me that the first two angels did not have pleasant news, right? The everlasting gospel was a pronouncement of impending wrath, but it was a temporal judgment that would crush earthly power. It's a judgment you'd see with your eyes. The second angel pronounced that Babylon by name would be destroyed. So it's not just some general judgment of the first angel, the second angel specifies, God's coming to judge the kingdom of the Antichrist, referred to as Babylon. But I believe that of all three of the proclamations, this one bears the most serious consequence. It's one thing to be warned of imminent judgment, it's another thing to know that the evil world order will be destroyed, but this angel says that beyond the judgment and destruction of those earthly structures and systems, that there is an eternal punishment, an eternal punishment for those who have rejected God and have instead worshiped the Antichrist and chosen allegiance to his system. And that's where I want us to pick up in verse nine, where he says, "A third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, 'If anyone worships the beast and his image, and receives his mark on his forehead or on his hand, that person shall also drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out full strength into the cup of His indignation. He shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb.'" Verse 11 says, "And the smoke of their torment ascends for forever and ever." Think about that, for forever and ever. "And they have no rest day or night, who worship the beast and his image, and whoever receives the mark of his name." And there is no doubt in our minds that this is a reference to the doctrine of hell, which is eternal torment. Now we live in a time when someone can claim to believe in Jesus, while maintaining that faith and those beliefs in obscurity and even in anonymity. But in the age of the Antichrist, anonymity is a word that will no longer exist, for it will be impossible to remain anonymous no matter where you are in the world. Anonymity will be an impossibility during the global order of the Antichrist. The reign of the Antichrist will be a fulfillment of the Orwellian prophecy in the novel "1984". The global order of the Antichrist will be the ultimate surveillance state. It will be the totalitarian enforcement of political correctness. It will be characterized by the patrolling, not of national borders or of city streets, but of human thoughts. It will be characterized and known by an economy that requires unconditional conformity in order to survive. It will, to put it bluntly, have a mandate of unqualified and total surrender by all inhabitants of planet earth during his reign. And in such an environment, we believe the church will have been raptured, but there will be people who will be saved during the Tribulation. And there will be no such thing during the Tribulation as a closet Christian. There will be no such thing during the Tribulation as half-hearted followers of Jesus. The line will be drawn by the Antichrist during the Tribulation. The choice will be forced by the Antichrist. It's either worship the Antichrist and have his mark upon you, or worship the true Christ and have His heavenly mark placed upon you. The stakes are high. And according to the verses we just read of Revelation 14, 9, 10, and 11, if you receive the mark of the beast, your punishment is eternal hell. It could not be anymore explicitly stated in the Word of God. Now I have to tell you something tonight, the doctrine of eternal hell is the most disturbing and unsettling of all the teachings in the Bible to me. I've heard about hell all of my life, I've talked about hell a lot in my life, I've even heard jokes and made jokes about hell all of my life, but to sit back and ponder the reality of it, that it truly is a place of torment, that there is no end, that the fire goeth not out, it is not quenched, the torment never ceases, it is unceasing into the eons of eternity. And just as much as we delight in the unending eons of an eternal state in heaven, so I grieve over the same corresponding truth, that as eternal as heavenly existence is, so existence in hell is equally eternal. There's no end in sight ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever. It is unrelenting, it is perpetual. Talking about it now on this platform, in this empty room makes me lightheaded, makes my stomach queasy, I don't like talking about it, I don't want to believe it, but the Bible teaches it, and I must believe that it is true. I don't understand it, but I believe it, as painful as it is to believe. And throughout the years I've heard many people say, "Well you know, I believe in Jesus, and Jesus is all about love, and kindness, and forgiveness, and doing good to your neighbor, and everything I believe about Jesus, there is no way that the Jesus that I believe in would want us to believe in such a terrible place like hell." And as I've studied the sayings of Jesus and I've studied the teachings of the New Testament, I wanna provide a response to those who say that the loving Lord Jesus Christ would never ever want us to believe in a concept like hell, that the loving and merciful precious Lord Jesus Christ who died for all, that He would somehow never want our thoughts to be troubled by some concept of eternal damnation. Let's look at this chart, the doctrine of hell in the New Testament. Consider this with me, Hell is mentioned 12 times in the New Testament, and 11 of those instances were by Jesus. So 11 out of the 12 occurrences of the word hell mentioned by itself were spoken by Jesus Himself. Consider this, the words, hell fire, that phrase is mentioned 19 times in the New Testament, and 12 of those 19 were stated, uttered by Jesus. 12 of the 19 references to hell fire. And so the summary of this is simply that the words of Jesus contain more references to hell than all the authors of the other New Testament books. So does that not convince you that if Jesus is the one who said more about hell than anyone else who contributed to the New Testament, that should let you know that Jesus was serious about hell, because hell is real. The doctrine of hell cannot be denied. And so forget all of these liberal Christians, these powder puff pie in the sky Christians who don't wanna believe in what the Bible teaches. I'm with you, I don't wanna believe it, but just because I don't wanna believe it doesn't mean that hell isn't hot and hell isn't forever. Forget all these liberal Christians, which by the way, liberal Christians are gonna be weeded out in the next several years, I can tell you that. We are inching closer and closer and closer to where Christians are gonna have to put their money where their mouth is in these days in which such radical anti-God, anti-Bible, anti-Christian agendas are being set into motion with the stroke of a pen. Every day you wake up and every night you go to bed, more and more of these proclamations which trample the Word of God underfoot. It's gonna separate, excuse the sexist expression, it's gonna separate the men from the boys when it comes to who's really serious about their faith. And what you need to know is, whether or not some liberal Christian denies the doctrine of hell, these who don't even know God, who make light of, and reject the notion of hell, this passage of Scripture tells us that those who reject Christ will face an eternal torment in a place called hell. And my chest is hurting talking about this right now. Literally, I have a pain in my chest talking about it. So I want us to consider what we've seen so far in this chapter. 144,000 were sealed by God in the seventh chapter, but in the beginning of this chapter, they are seen standing, having survived the Tribulation, to welcome their returning Messiah to Jerusalem. Then we have heard the angelic proclamation that there will be a complete destruction of the Antichrist, his political, his religious empire. And then we have heard the promise of torment to those who choose to worship the wrong Christ, they worship the Antichrist and not Jesus Christ. And if this chapter, chapter 14, proves anything, it proves this and don't you miss out tonight, it proves that our God whom we worship, He will get the last word. He will get the last word. So then we're gonna wrap it all up. John hears another voice from heaven, which we discover is none other than the Holy Spirit, and the words the Holy Spirit utters from heaven into John's ears, these words contain a wonderful declaration about those who die because of their faith in Jesus Christ. In verse 13, John says, "Then I heard a voice from heaven saying to me, 'Write this down, blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on.' 'Yes,' says the Holy Spirit, 'that they may rest from their labors, and their works follow them.'" Now I believe that what John is hearing is that for this moment in the period of Tribulation, as the plot is thickening, and the timeline is drawing us near to the end, don't get confused by this fast-forward in the chronology, the sneak peek with binoculars, what the Holy Spirit wants John to know is that those who do not receive the mark and who die, the 144,000 do not die, they are sealed with protection, but most others will die because of their faith during the Tribulation. And the Holy Spirit says, "John, write these words down, blessed is everyone who dies in the Lord during this time, because it means they'll be given rest from their labors, deliverance from the persecution, final and ultimate rescue from all of the assaults of the world system against them." He's speaking here about the martyrs during the Tribulation, blessed are those. Fulfilled, rejoiced, and rewarded are those who die in the Lord during the Tribulation. And it is a reminder to all of us that dying for your faith in Christ is better than living because you denied Christ. Let that sink in for a moment. You are much more blessed, fulfilled, and happy if your faith is the reason for which you are sent out of this world, than for you to forfeit faith and worship a false Christ just to stay alive in this world. It is equally clear that the pain of death for a Christian is the only pain we will ever know. But the death of an unbeliever brings pain from which they will never escape. Now, I don't have time for you to write all that down, you can just snap a shot of it with your phone if you want to, but I'm telling you, this is the truth, and these tribulation martyrs will bear witness to these realities. So in these closing verses, starting in verse 14, we have two angels who take a sickle, which is a harvesting instrument. It can either be held with the curved blade in one's hand, or it can be attached to a handle and it can be swung as you're harvesting the heads of wheat from the field when it's time to gather in the crop. This final section is about these two angels who go out and harvest the earth. These are the sickles of death, the sickles of judgment. And in verses 14 through 16, there is what we can call the first angelic harvester. Some believe that this angel described is Jesus. It's easy to believe that because he's riding on a white cloud, he's got a golden crown on his head, and he's even said to have the appearance likened to the Son of man. And as much as that sounds like Jesus, I don't believe it's Jesus, because another angel actually instructs this angel with the gold crown to go harvest the earth. It is hard for me to believe that a created angel could give the Lord Jesus Christ instructions of any kind. So I think this first harvester angel that is sent forth to bring about the sweeping plague and famine of death is an angel bearing a crown as the representative of Jesus, but not Jesus Himself. That's just my thought. And it tells us in verse 16, that that angel sat on the cloud, and He thrust His sickle on the earth, and the earth was reaped, okay? There's a second angel who reaps. Let's look in verses 19 and 20, that angel swung his sickle over the earth and loaded the grapes into the great winepress of God's wrath. The grapes were trampled in the winepress outside the city, and blood flowed from the winepress in a stream about 180 miles long and as high as a horse's bridle. So what I believe is that this first harvester angel is the precursor to the return of Christ. This second harvester angel actually depicts in a symbolic fashion the return of Christ, and how the enemies of Christ will be trampled in the winepress of God's wrath. So it's a reference to final destruction. Now, the trampling out of grapes in the winepress was an image with which the New Testament readers, John's audience, would be familiar. But rather than the workers in the vineyard trampling these ripe and fattened grapes under their bare feet in the winepress, what John is seeing is that this angel with its sickle is harvesting all of these ripe and fattened grapes, which represent the rebellious of mankind, including the global order, including religious and political Babylon, and will put them into a symbolic winepress, and rather than workers from the vineyard trampling out these fattened grapes to get their juice, it will be God and His bare feet trampling these grapes and crushing them under His feet, which is a very vivid symbol of God's feet executing wrath on the inhabitants of earth when Christ returns. And what John describes is, as these grapes are being crushed in this figurative winepress, that that dark fruit of the vine, that juice that's been crushed from the skin of these fat grapes, it symbolizes the blood that is going to flow throughout the field of battle in the last days, the final battle, the final world war that we call the battle of Armageddon. This is a sneak peek, it will be described later in the book of Revelation, but it just so happens that this reference to blood covering, a stream of blood covering a distance of 180 miles, that just happens to be right about the same length of the nation of Israel in Holy Land. Now, when it talks about the blood reaching up to the bridle of the horses, I believe that's what John saw with the juice flowing out of the winepress of God's wrath. But I think it would be near impossible for there to be bridle height blood, up for a distance of 200 miles. I'm not denying that it's a possibility, but I do believe what is being depicted here symbolically is that this will be massive carnage, as Christ returns and breaths His wrath over all of the armies that Antichrist will have summoned into the Holy Land for the great and final battle of the ages. When just as he is about to exterminate Israel from the globe, Christ returns, and the entire Holy Land upon the return of Christ becomes a field filled with the blood of the unrighteous ones. This is what John is seeing. And it is this idea of God trampling out the grapes of wrath when Christ returns, it is this passage that inspired the lyrics of "The Battle Hymn of the Republic." Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord. He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored. In this passage that we are reading, the second angel with his sickle harvesting the grapes, thrown into the press, trampled by the feet of God, this is God trampling out His vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored. Glory, glory, hallelujah. His truth is marching on. And you see, in the great winepress of God's wrath, when the feet of Christ figuratively will crush the grapes of resistance, every blasphemer will be squashed like a grape, every agent of Satan and the Antichrist will be crushed under Christ's feet, every officer of the thought police will be vanquished by wrath, every Anti-Semite and persecutor of the saints will be consumed by the fire of God's vengeance, and every purveyor of Babylon, it's global political order and its religious prostitution, will be banished forever to hell. And I want you to know before we pray when we see the forces of wickedness and evil on the loose, with what seems to be all restraints removed, what you need to do is to envision each of their heads as being one big fat grape, that's going to be crushed by the wrath of the Lord Jesus Christ. And when you see people parading their blasphemy and their agenda to subvert the foundations of society established by the word of God, and to silence the spreading of truth through the gospel of Jesus Christ, you need to think about the bare feet of God pounding them into the bloodshed that is described in Revelation. And if that doesn't help soothe you for a moment, just squint your eyes and see the flames of hell lapping up at these who make an open mockery of God's commandments, God's truth, the gospel of Jesus Christ, and the saints of the Living God. I hope, that as morbid and as sobering as these truths are, I hope that when you log off tonight from this livestream, you will realize that our God wins the day. And you and I, we're on His side, because we have trusted in the true Christ. Father, I thank you for this study. And I thank you for helping someone like me who doesn't have sense enough to get in and out of the rain, and wouldn't know how to find You if I had sense enough to look for You. Somehow in Your grace and mercy, You pursued me, opened my eyes as a young boy, and helped me to understand that Jesus is the Christ. And He's not just one of the ways to You, oh God, He is the way, the truth, and the life. Thank you for opening my ignorant mind to these eternal truths. Lord, I stand in awe of Your greatness, and I wanna praise You that You've rescued me from a devil's hell. And that as painful as it is to think about hell, that's the only hell I'll ever experience, is thinking about it, because due to the shed blood of Jesus I don't ever have to worry about going there. And I pray that tonight we'll all put our heads on the pillow and fall asleep in peace, knowing that no matter how much hell seems to be advancing, we have a seal on our foreheads, in the name of our Father, and the name of our Savior, are written in blood across our souls, and we are forever Yours, hallelujah. In Jesus' name, amen.
