Today, Monday June 13
The Battle of Armageddon
Revelation 14:17-20 “Then another angel came out of the temple which is in heaven, he also having a sharp sickle. And another angel came out from the altar, who had power over fire, and he cried with a loud cry to him who had the sharp sickle, saying, "Thrust in your sharp sickle and gather the clusters of the vine of the earth, for her grapes are fully ripe." So the angel thrust his sickle into the earth and gathered the vine of the earth, and threw it into the great winepress of the wrath of God. And the winepress was trampled outside the city, and blood came out of the winepress, up to the horses' bridles, for one thousand six hundred furlongs.”
In these last few verses of Revelation 14, John sees two more angels. The first one comes out of the temple in heaven and has a sharp sickle. Remember back in verse 14, that we were told that the Son of Man was sitting on a cloud and had a sharp sickle in His hand. So, we believe that this last angel seen here in verse 17 is none other than the Lord Jesus Christ coming back at the very end of the Seven-year Tribulation for the last great battle during this time called the “Battle of Armageddon”.
The first angel had proclaimed that “the hour of His judgment has come” (v. 7), and then the fourth angel announces that the “time has come” (v. 15) to reap the harvest. Now the last and sixth angel gives the command to the One, Jesus Christ, Who has the sharp sickle, to gather the clusters of the vine of the earth. We believe that this is now speaking of the very last days of the Tribulation when the battle of Armageddon takes place.
When Jesus came the first time to earth, He came in the flesh as a baby in Bethlehem. He lived a perfect, sinless life for thirty-three and half years. He healed the sick, gave sight to the blind, caused the lame to walk, feed the hundred and proclaimed the message of repentance and the kingdom! He came as a Lamb to go humbly to a cross and give His life voluntarily as a substitute in our place for our sins. Jesus said that He didn’t come to condemn the world but that the world through Him might be saved (John 3:18).
Jesus came because “God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whoever would believe in Him would not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16). The first time, Jesus came as the Sower, sowing the Seed of Himself, the Living Word, to a lost world. But when Jesus comes the second time at the end of Tribulation, He will come as the Reaper to gather His harvest and grapes that are His, and to execute judgment on all those who have rejected Him because they chose to follow the Antichrist and his evil wicked ways.
The last verses of this chapter 14 give us the picture of grapes in a winepress. A winepress in the times of the Bible was two large stone basins with one higher than the other with a trough between them. The grapes are gathered from the harvest would be placed in the upper basin and would be stomped under the feet of the workers and until all the juice out of the grapes was crushed out, which then would flow to the lower basin.
We believe Revelation 14:19-10 is speaking of how at the very end of the Tribulation God will gather all the armies of Antichrist and the nations of the world to “outside the city” of Jerusalem. God uses at least five different men in the Bible to describe this event. David in Psalm 2:1-5, 9; Isaiah in Isaiah 34:1-6, 63:3-6; Joel in Joel 3:2, 9-16; Zechariah in Zechariah 14:2, 3, 12; and John in Revelation 14:14-20, 16:16, 19:11-21.
We are given the name Armageddon for this great last battle in Revelation 16:14-16: “For they are spirits of demons, performing signs, which go out to the kings of the earth and of the whole world, to gather them to the battle of that great day of God Almighty…. And they gathered them together to the place called in Hebrew, Armageddon.”
We will see this in more detail later as we study Revelation, chapters 16 and 19. But here in this verse, it indicates that outside the city of Jerusalem in Israel, the blood will flow about four feet deep and two-hundreds miles long and from the Mediterranean Sea on the west coast to the hills of Moab (Jordan) on the east side. It will be greatest bloodbath the world has ever seen.
Again, we need to be assured that God is the righteous Judge Who always does what is right and best! There is salvation for all who repent and believe but if we reject His Son as our Savior, we will perish (John 3:16).
God bless!
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