Series Guide

Revelation: The King Wins

How toOverview1234567891011

1213141516171819202122Further Reading

Chapter sixteen

Explore: The Seven Bowls of Wrath

We reach the third cycle of seven bowls, after the seven seals and seven trumpets. The bowls continue the sense of escalation, and intensify the drama of the book by building on what has come before.

Whereas the seals and trumpets brought about limited devastation, here it is total and complete. After this, Revelation will turn to describe the final defeat of Babylon (as the representative of all that is evil) and the Beast.

Deuteronomy 32:4

⁴He is the Rock, his works are perfect,
and all his ways are just.
A faithful God who does no wrong,
upright and just is he.

The Seven Bowls of God’s Wrath

16 Then I heard a loud voice from the temple saying to the seven angels, “Go, pour out the seven bowls of God’s wrath on the earth.”

²The first angel went and poured out his bowl on the land, and ugly, festering sores broke out on the people who had the mark of the beast and worshiped its image.

³The second angel poured out his bowl on the sea, and it turned into blood like that of a dead person, and every living thing in the sea died.

⁴The third angel poured out his bowl on the rivers and springs of water, and they became blood. ⁵Then I heard the angel in charge of the waters say:

“You are just in these judgments, O Holy One,
you who are and who were;
⁶for they have shed the blood of your holy people and your prophets,
and you have given them blood to drink as they deserve.”

⁷And I heard the altar respond:

“Yes, Lord God Almighty,
true and just are your judgments.”

This mirrors the sixth plague brought on Egypt in the Exodus story.

During the second trumpet, a third of the sea turned into blood (Revelation 8:8-9). Now it escalates to include the entire sea. The sea was not only central to sea-life, but to all trade and commerce in the Roman Empire, and so the effect described here is one of utter devastation.

Where the second trumpet saw destruction on a third of the sea (Revelation 8:9), now it is complete destruction.

The earlier cry for justice from the martyrs (Revelation 6:9-11) is now finally answered. Those who took their lives will in turn pay with their own.

In Revelation 6:9-11, the altar had underneath ‘the souls of those who had been slain because of the word of God and the testimony they maintained’.

⁸The fourth angel poured out his bowl on the sun, and the sun was allowed to scorch people with fire. ⁹They were seared by the intense heat and they cursed the name of God, who had control over these plagues, but they refused to repent and glorify him.

¹⁰The fifth angel poured out his bowl on the throne of the beast, and its kingdom was plunged into darkness. People gnawed their tongues in agony ¹¹and cursed the God of heaven because of their pains and their sores, but they refused to repent of what they had done.

Fire is a common weapon of judgement in Revelation. The two witnesses devoured their enemies with fire (Revelation 11:5). Babylon will be consumed by fire (Revelation 18:8).

This is similar to Pharoah’s response to Moses in refusing to let Israel go or recognise the authority of the God of the Israelites. Even in the face of such devastation, the people refuse to repent and instead harden their hearts even further.

This is the throne of the beast from Revelation 13:2. It is the source of the beast’s authority. The bowl being poured out on this throne is a sign of its destruction.

Similar to the ninth plague on Egypt. With the fourth trumpet, we saw a third of the sky turned to darkness (Revelation 8:12). Here, the entire kingdom of the beast is engulfed in darkness.

We are reminded that the people who suffered the sores from the first bowl in verse 2 are part of the kingdom of the beast that is now in darkness.

Explore: The Euphrates

In the sixth trumpet, the Euphrates river represented the barrier between the Roman Empire to the West and the Parthian Empire to the East (Revelation 9:14-16). It was symbolic that a more fearsome judgement would come than that of the armies of the Parthians.

At the sixth trumpet, the four angels were released at the Euphrates river, allowing the enormous armies to bring their advance where a third of the people were killed. Here, the river is instead ‘dried up’, which allows the ‘Kings from the East’ to begin advancing with their armies.

After the sixth seal was opened (Revelation 6:12, 15), we saw the kings of the earth, and indeed all of God’s enemies crying out in unison in response to the great judgement that was coming upon them (Revelation 6:16-17). Here at the sixth bowl, we see them gathering together and about to be destroyed.

Rather than being a literal drying up of the river, this verse is echoing that of the sixth trumpet to warn that, whatever they imagine as the more fearsome army, an even greater threat is about to come upon them.

The drying of the river likely also alludes to the parting of the Red Sea in Exodus, another reference to the Exodus story.

Ezekiel 38:17-23

¹⁷“‘This is what the Sovereign Lord says: You are the one I spoke of in former days by my servants the prophets of Israel. At that time they prophesied for years that I would bring you against them. ¹⁸This is what will happen in that day: When Gog attacks the land of Israel, my hot anger will be aroused, declares the Sovereign Lord. ¹⁹In my zeal and fiery wrath I declare that at that time there shall be a great earthquake in the land of Israel. ²⁰The fish in the sea, the birds in the sky, the beasts of the field, every creature that moves along the ground, and all the people on the face of the earth will tremble at my presence. The mountains will be overturned, the cliffs will crumble and every wall will fall to the ground. ²¹I will summon a sword against Gog on all my mountains, declares the Sovereign Lord. Every man’s sword will be against his brother. ²²I will execute judgment on him with plague and bloodshed; I will pour down torrents of rain, hailstones and burning sulfur on him and on his troops and on the many nations with him. ²³And so I will show my greatness and my holiness, and I will make myself known in the sight of many nations. Then they will know that I am the Lord.’

Joel 2:11

¹¹The Lord thunders
    at the head of his army;
his forces are beyond number,
    and mighty is the army that obeys his command.
The day of the Lord is great;
    it is dreadful.
    Who can endure it?

Matthew 24:42-44

⁴²“Therefore keep watch, because you do not know on what day your Lord will come. ⁴³But understand this: If the owner of the house had known at what time of night the thief was coming, he would have kept watch and would not have let his house be broken into. ⁴⁴So you also must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him.

1 Thessalonians 5:2-5

2 Peter 3:10

¹⁰But the day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything done in it will be laid bare.

Judges 5:19

¹⁹“Kings came, they fought,
the kings of Canaan fought.
At Taanach, by the waters of Megiddo,
they took no plunder of silver.

2 Chronicles 35:20-22

²⁰After all this, when Josiah had set the temple in order, Necho king of Egypt went up to fight at Carchemish on the Euphrates, and Josiah marched out to meet him in battle. ²¹But Necho sent messengers to him, saying, “What quarrel is there, king of Judah, between you and me? It is not you I am attacking at this time, but the house with which I am at war. God has told me to hurry; so stop opposing God, who is with me, or he will destroy you.”

²²Josiah, however, would not turn away from him, but disguised himself to engage him in battle. He would not listen to what Necho had said at God’s command but went to fight him on the plain of Megiddo.

Zechariah 12:10-11

¹⁰“And I will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem a spirit^[a] of grace and supplication. They will look on^[b] me, the one they have pierced, and they will mourn for him as one mourns for an only child, and grieve bitterly for him as one grieves for a firstborn son. ¹¹On that day the weeping in Jerusalem will be as great as the weeping of Hadad Rimmon in the plain of Megiddo.

¹²The sixth angel poured out his bowl on the great river Euphrates, and its water was dried up to prepare the way for the kings from the East. ¹³Then I saw three impure spirits that looked like frogs; they came out of the mouth of the dragon, out of the mouth of the beast and out of the mouth of the false prophet. ¹⁴They are demonic spirits that perform signs, and they go out to the kings of the whole world, to gather them for the battle on the great day of God Almighty.

¹⁵“Look, I come like a thief! Blessed is the one who stays awake and remains clothed, so as not to go naked and be shamefully exposed.”

¹⁶Then they gathered the kings together to the place that in Hebrew is called Armageddon.

As with the sixth trumpet, this is symbolically using the Parthian Empire to the East of the Roman Empire as a way of describing the fearful power of the coming judgement.

The symbolism of the ‘Kings from the East’ is now made clearer. It is not the literal Parthian Empire, but the counterfeit trinity of dragon, beast and false prophet (from Revelation 12-13).

The Jewish expectation was of a future day of a cosmic battle where God would defeat his enemies once and for all. It is the completion of all God’s plans and promises to his people. However, as we shall see in Revelation 19:19-21, this great war is over in the blink of an eye. For as great and powerful as the armies of God’s enemies are, God’s own power is infinitely greater still.

The warning is given that this final judgement will be sudden and unexpected to many, and therefore we should be aware and ready ourselves. The language of a thief follows the theme found in Matthew 24:42-44, 1 Thessalonians 5:2-5 and 2 Peter 3:10.

Explore: Armageddon

The kings of the earth were gathered by the counterfeit trinity in Revelation 16:14. We are told that the place they will gather is called Armageddon.

There is much debate about what the term Armageddon means, and whether it is referring to a geographical location, or some other symbolism of its name.

In literal terms, the name means “mount of Megiddo”. Megiddo was an ancient city in Israel, and the location of some significant battles (eg. Judges 5:19; 2 Chronicles 35:20-22). However, it is largely a flat place, and not a mountain of any kind.

Zechariah 12 describes a day when God’s people will come under great attack from the nations. God’s saves his people in dramatic circumstances, leading to an outpouring of weeping that is described as being “as great as the weeping of Hadad Rimmon in the plain of Megiddo” (Zechariah 12:11). Zechariah 12, therefore, sets Megiddo out as the place that the nations will gather in opposition to the people of God – which is what is being described in Revelation 16.

Lastly, in Revelation 9:11, we saw a similar example where the angel of the Abyss, we are told, “whose name in Hebrew is Abaddon”. There, the Hebrew name is important for its symbolic meaning, and that is likely in view here, too. Armageddon is the symbolic place where the nations will gather against the people of God for the ‘final battle’.

Exodus 19:16-19

¹⁶On the morning of the third day there was thunder and lightning, with a thick cloud over the mountain, and a very loud trumpet blast. Everyone in the camp trembled. ¹⁷Then Moses led the people out of the camp to meet with God, and they stood at the foot of the mountain. ¹⁸Mount Sinai was covered with smoke, because the Lord descended on it in fire. The smoke billowed up from it like smoke from a furnace, and the whole mountain trembled violently. ¹⁹As the sound of the trumpet grew louder and louder, Moses spoke and the voice of God answered him.

¹⁷The seventh angel poured out his bowl into the air, and out of the temple came a loud voice from the throne, saying, “It is done!” ¹⁸Then there came flashes of lightning, rumblings, peals of thunder and a severe earthquake. No earthquake like it has ever occurred since mankind has been on earth, so tremendous was the quake. ¹⁹The great city split into three parts, and the cities of the nations collapsed. God remembered Babylon the Great and gave her the cup filled with the wine of the fury of his wrath. ²⁰Every island fled away and the mountains could not be found. ²¹From the sky huge hailstones, each weighing about a hundred pounds, fell on people. And they cursed God on account of the plague of hail, because the plague was so terrible.

As was hinted at by the seventh seal and seventh trumpet, the seventh bowl brings about an end to all history.

The storm and earthquake are again symbolic of the presence of God coming upon creation. They particularly recall God’s appearing in the Exodus story (eg. Exodus 19:16-19).

This reminds us of the effects of the earthquake at the opening of the sixth seal (Revelation 6:12-14). Being split into three parts simply indicates complete destruction.

God remembers the evil of his enemies, symbolised by the city of Babylon. This was also the content of the prayers of God’s people for which they requested justice (Revelation 6:10, 16:5-7).

This repeats the language of chapter 14, where God’s enemies will “drink the wine of God’s fury…the cup of his wrath” (Revelation 14:10) and where God’s enemies are gathered into “the great winepress of God’s wrath” (Revelation 14:19).

This describes the complete levelling of the world.

An allusion to Hosea 10:8 is also likely in view here. This was quoted earlier in Revelation 6:16, where the peoples of the earth cried for the mountains and hills to hide them from the judgement of God. Here, there is no escaping as there are no mountains to be found.

This reminds us of the seventh plague in Egypt. They are said to weigh about 45 kilograms (about 50 times the size of the present world record) indicating how devastating and destructive they will be.