02.27. LECTURE No. 27 -- Rev_8:13; Rev_9:1-12
LECTURE No. 27 -- Revelation 8:13; Revelation 9:1-12
More Trumpet Judgments - The Plain Meaning of the Text - This Book Intended to Reveal the Truth, Not to Hide It - Unbelief Is Foolish - Unbelievers Classified - Six Interesting Things About the Bottomless Pit - Strange Locusts to Come from the Bottomless Pit to Plague Men Upon Earth - These Strange Creatures to Have a King - An Interesting Comment
A STUDY of the Book of Revelation is necessary and is made more urgent than ever before because of present world conditions. So many things are happening these days which are in exact fulfillment of the prophetic scriptures, that it would both unwise and foolish to neglect to refuse to study this last book of Bible.
I am sure that those who have been studying these messages agree that this wonderful book contains, after all, a message of light, and truth and comfort for those of us who are living today.
Therefore, with open minds and with sincere hearts, let us continue our study of the book of REVELATION, asking God, by His Holy Spirit, to help us understand these things that have been written here for our instruction.
We have progressed in our present study to Revelation 8:13, where our present lesson will begin.
Our last lesson was based upon Revelation 8:7-12, and we considered those events which are to come upon the world at the sounding of the first four Trumpets.
- When the first Trumpet is sounded a great storm of hail and fire, mingled with blood will come upon the earth, at which time one-third of the trees, and all of the green grass will be burned up.
- When the second Trumpet is sounded, a great flaming mass will fall into the sea, and one-third of the sea will become blood, and one-third of the creatures in the sea will die and one-third of the ships will be destroyed.
- When the third Trumpet is sounded, a great Star called Wormwood will fall from heaven upon a third part of the rivers, and upon the fountains of water, and as a result one-third of the waters will become bitter, and many will die when they drink of the poisoned waters.
- When the fourth Trumpet is sounded, a third part of the sun, and a third part of the moon, and a third of the Stars will be smitten, and the earth will be darkened when they fail to give forth their light. An Announcement of Woe In Revelation 8:13, John said:- “And I beheld, and heard an angel flying through the midst of heaven, saying with a loud voice, Woe, woe, woe, to the inhabiters of the earth by reason of the other voices of the trumpet of the three angels, which are yet to sound!”
It would seem as if this unusual statement was made to impress John and those of us who read and study these things, with the importance of those things which shall come to pass at the sounding of these three last trumpets. Those things which shall come to pass at the sounding of the first four Trumpets will be very bad indeed, but what is to happen at the sounding of the last three Trumpets will be even worse. Therefore, these last three Trumpets are sometimes designated as the “WOE TRUMPETS.”
What we have therefore is a prophetic warning in advance of the actual fulfillment of these things, that God is going to send terrible judgments upon the world.
Advance Lesson Now let us advance in our study by reading what is written in Revelation 9:1-12, where it says,-
“And the fifth angel sounded, and I saw a star fall from heaven unto the earth; and to him was given the key of the bottomless pit.
“And he opened the bottomless pit; and there arose a smoke out of the pit, as the smoke of a great furnace; and the sun and the air were darkened by reason of the smoke of the pit.
“And there came out of the smoke locusts upon the earth; and unto them was given power, as the scorpions of the earth have power.
“And it was commanded them that they should not hurt the grass of the earth, neither any green thing, neither any tree; but only those men which have not the seal of God in their foreheads.
“And to them it was given that they should not kill them, but that they should be tormented five months: and their torment was as the torment of a scorpion, when he striketh a man.
“And in those days shall men seek death, and shall not find it; and shall desire to die, and death shall flee from them.
“And the shapes of the locusts were like unto horses prepared unto battle, and on their heads were, as it were crowns like gold, and their faces were as the faces of men.
“And they had hair as the hair of women, and their teeth were as the teeth of lions.
“And they had breastplates, as it were breastplates of iron; and the sound of their wings was as the sound of chariots of many horses running to battle.
“And they had tails like unto scorpions, and there were stings in their tails; and their power was to hurt men five months.
“And they had a king over them, which is the angel of the bottomless pit, whose name in the Hebrew tongue is Abaddon, but in the Greek tongue hath his name Apollyon.
“One woe is past; and, behold, there come two woes more, hereafter.” The Curtain Rises
We must all agree that as the curtain rises upon the drama of events, set forth in our lesson, a strange scene meets our eyes, and I presume the first thing necessary will be to decide whether we are to accept this passage as literal or symbolic.
This is an important question because if we should make a mistake in this regard we would soon be involved in a mass of confusion. But we are still convinced that this Book was intended to reveal the truth and not to hide it. And the only safe principle of interpretation is to accept any passage as literal, unless the text or context indicates that it is symbolic.
By following this principle of interpretation we will more quickly and more accurately arrive at the truth which the passage is intended to teach than any other. God alone knows the time which has been wasted, and the harm which has been done by scholarly men who are always trying to make the Bible mean something other than what it says. Why can we not take the Word of God for what says, and believe what is written as is written, unless the text or context indicates to the contrary?
Unbelief Always a Hindrance
I am afraid that our faith is oftentimes hindered by an element of unbelief which may have crept in unawares, into our hearts. I see no reason for disbelieving the Word of God, except for unbelief, or a lack of understanding.
Unbelief Defined Generally speaking unbelievers may be classified as atheists, infidels, agnostics and free-thinkers.
Atheist An atheist is a man who does not believe there is a God. All such are spoken of in the scriptures as being fools; for David said, “The fool saith in his heart there is no God.”
Infidel An infidel is defined in the dictionary as one who rejects religion or divine revelation. In a Christian country an infidel would be considered as a non-Christian.
Agnostic An agnostic is defined in the dictionary as one who denies that man possesses any knowledge of the intimate nature of things, in other words, he is one who says, “I don’t know,” to everything pertaining to religion. Thus he seeks to escape all responsibility to God on a plea of ignorance.
Free-Thinkers A free-thinker, we are told, is one who develops his opinions independently, especially in regard to religious matters, and is sometimes spoken of as a skeptic or rationalist. As a rule a free-thinker will not believe or accept anything which does not bear the mark of modern scholarship.
In other words he is worshipping at the shrine of scholarship, and refuses to believe anything that has been given by divine revelation.
Orthodox
Now there is another group of religious thinkers who are spoken of as being Orthodox. The word orthodox literally leans, “thinking straight.” Those who are orthodox, therefore, usually hold to the conservative opinion, especially in regard to religion. We often speak of the Orthodox Jews, as compared to other groups in Israel, because they still hold strictly to the teaching of Moses, and do their very best to live according to the law which Moses gave.
Fundamental Christians Believe the Word
Those in Christian circles today who believe the deity of Christ and the power of His resurrection, and the fact of His present High Priesthood in the heavenlies, and the promise that He will come again, are spoken of as being Fundamental, and because of their faith along these lines, they often find it necessary to separate themselves from their modernistic brethren, who do not believe these things, and who will not allow them to be taught in the churches.
Unsound Orthodoxy
It is a sad thing, however, that we often find a great deal of unbelief among those who claim to be orthodox. Even in Jesus’ time there were Jews who claimed to be orthodox, yet who entirely rejected Jesus and refused to believe the words which He spoke. This was proof that they were orthodox in name only; for if they had been orthodox at heart they would have believed in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ, and in the mighty miracles which He performed, and in the words which He spoke. But the fact that they rejected Him was proof that their orthodoxy was in name only, and that they were not orthodox in their hearts.
False Fundamentalism The same thing applies today regarding many people who claim to be Fundamental in their thinking concerning religious matters, who, while they hold tenaciously to the fundamentals of the Gospel, do not by any means believe the whole word of God.
They claim to believe the truth but if you undertake to preach the whole Word of God, some of them will rise up against you and openly say they do not believe this, and do not believe that, although it is in the Word of God.
Please do not misunderstand me. I am a Fundamentalist myself, and have great love and respect for those who are Fundamental in their acceptance of the Word of God; but when we say we are Fundamental, by all means, let us believe and accept THE WHOLE WORD OF GOD; otherwise we are likely to be Fundamental in name only, and we are likely to stand up so straight that we lean backwards.
For a man to say he is fundamental and then reject whatever portion of the Word of God he does not like, or which does not seem to fit into his preconceived, or narrow conception of things, is positive proof that he is fundamental in name only, and that after all his heart is filled with a lot of unbelief, which needs to be purged out before he can be truly orthodox or fundamental.
Why Do I Say This?
Now why have I taken time to say all this? Merely because I wanted to find out how much faith you really have in the Word of God before we undertake to study the lesson text. If we have faith to believe what is written here; then good and well, and how happy our hearts will be in believing what is here written in the Word of God! The Bottomless Pit
Now, when the fifth angel sounded John said, “I saw a Star fall from heaven unto the earth: and to him was given the key of the bottomless pit.”
It is perfectly clear from the wording here that the Star which John saw fall from heaven unto the earth was not a literal star, because he is referred to as a person, for it says, “to HIM was given the key of the bottomless pit.”
There seems to be no accurate way of determining just who the Star represents. After all, that is not the important thing. Although the identity of this divine messenger is not revealed, the work which he is to perform is clearly stated, for it says, “to HIM was given the key of the bottomless pit, and he opened the bottomless pit; and there arose a smoke out of the pit, as the smoke of a great furnace; and the sun and the air were darkened by reason of the smoke of the pit.”
It would seem that this same angel is referred to in Revelation 20:1-3; where John said,
“I saw an angel come down from heaven, having the key of the bottomless pit and a great chain in his hand, and he laid hold on the dragon, that old serpent, which is the devil, and Satan, and bound him a thousand years, and cast him into the bottomless pit, and shut him up, and set a seal upon him, that he should deceive the nations no more, till the thousand years should be fulfilled, and after that he must be loosed a little season.”
Why the Pit Will Be Opened And so we see that there is an angel whose duty it is to open and to seal the door of the bottomless pit at God’s command.
In our lesson text, he is to open the bottomless pit in order to let the infernal locusts loose upon the earth, in order that they might torment the wicked, unrepentant, unregenerate masses of humanity. At a future time he will also open the same pit in order cast Satan therein, after which he will seal the pit in order to keep Satan from coming out for a thousand years.
What Is the Bottomless Pit?
Now just here it will be necessary explain what is meant by the bottomless pit.
We should not get the idea that the bottomless pit is the same as hell or hades, or the place where fallen angels are now confined. Nor is the bottomless pit the same as the lake of fire. It is something entirely separate and different from all these.
According to the scriptures, it is the place where Satan is to be bound during the thousand years of the millennial reign of Christ; after which he must be loosed for a little season.
That there is such a place as the bottomless pit, is confirmed in Luke 8:31, where the demons, which were in the wild men of the Gadarenes, besought Jesus that He would not command them to go into the deep (that is, into the abyss or bottomless pit).
What Will Happen?
We are now ready to give our attention to what will happen when the bottomless pit is opened.
The first thing that is called to our attention is, that a great smoke will arise out of the pit, as the smoke of a great furnace, and that the sun and the air will become darkened by reason of the smoke of the pit.
For anyone who has lived near a live volcano, that is not difficult to believe. When we were in Japan it was our custom to spend some time each summer in the little town of Karuizwa, which was located only fourteen miles from the living volcano called “Asama-Yama.” The crater of the volcano was more than one-half a mile across, and was thousands of feet deep.
On one occasion we climbed the mountain with several others and looked at the lake of red hot lava, thousands of feet below.
On other occasions we saw the mountain smoking as a great furnace, belching forth smoke which ascended like a pillar of cloud, until it was caught in the currents of the upper air, and then it spread out like a great cloud obscuring the sun for many miles around.
I remember that, one day ashes fell out of such a cloud upon the village where we were, fourteen miles away, until the clothes of the people were covered, and the roofs of the houses were colored an ashen gray, by the very fine ashes which fell out of the sky.
Now this was only a miniature example of what is to happen when the Fifth Trumpet is sounded, and the bottomless pit is opened.
Locusts Will Come Forth But that is not all; for we are told that when the bottomless pit is opened, and the smoke of the pit covers the earth, there will come out of the smoke locusts upon the earth, and that power will be given unto them as the scorpions of the earth have power, and the purpose of their coming forth will be to hurt those men which will not have the seal of God in their foreheads.
We have already read a description of these strange locusts, and from the description which we have here, many expositors are inclined to look upon their description as a group of symbols, representing other things, and I must confess it would be easier, and would require less faith to believe this, than to accept the description as literal. Nevertheless there is no intimation in the lesson text that these are symbols, therefore, we are compelled to accept what is stated here literally.
Unbelief Can Not Comprehend
I know there are a lot of people who will object to this; because what is written here is contrary to anything they have ever known or heard about before. Therefore, they naturally assume that such creatures as those described here, could not possibly exist; but that, my friends, is where they are mistaken.
In refusing to believe this passage they discredit the creative power of God, and fail to take into consideration the fact that there are many things pertaining to the underworld which they themselves know nothing about.
The fact of the matter is, that if such creatures exist now, or ever did exist, God could create them for just such a purpose, if He wanted to do so!
This is confirmed in Exodus 10:3-20, where we have an account of the locusts which God sent upon the land of Egypt as one of the major plagues upon Pharaoh for refusing to let Israel go. In Exodus 10:14 of this passage it says, “And the locusts went up over all the land of Egypt, and rested in all the coasts of Egypt: very grievous were they; before them there were no such locusts as they, neither after them shall be such.”
Now, from this statement it is perfectly clear that God created those locusts especially to carry out His work of judgment against Pharaoh and the Egyptians. Would it not stand to reason, therefore, that God could create any sort of locust that he wanted to in order to carry out his plans and purposes in judgment?
The description of these locusts, therefore, should not in any wise hinder our faith, for after all, God is able to perform all these things which have been recorded in His own word. It would seem as if the locusts described here are to be some sort of infernal cherubim. They will be, in appearance, a strange combination of the horse, the man, the woman, the lion, and the scorpion.
They will be queer looking creatures, no doubt. But if God who made the horse, the man, the woman, and the lion, and the scorpion as individual and separate creatures, would he not be able to make another creature, combining all of these, and call it a locust? No one doubts but what he could, if he chose to do so. The Important Thing
After all the description of these locusts is not the most important thing about them, it is the thing which they were commanded to do which attracts our attention.
In Revelation 9:3-4 of our lesson text it says:
“And unto them was given power, as the scorpions of the earth have power, and it was commanded them that they should not hurt the grass of the earth, neither any green thing, neither any tree; but only those men which have not the seal of God in their foreheads.”
The reason, therefore, they are to be let loose upon the world will be in order that they may torment those men which have not the seal of God in their foreheads. And in Revelation 9:5 it says:
“To them it was given that they should not kill them, but that they should be tormented five months: and their torment was as the torment of a scorpion when he striketh a man.”
Impossible to Imagine
I am sure that none of us can even imagine what a terrible time that is going to be for the wicked of the earth. I suppose there is nothing more painful to anyone than the sting of a scorpion, and when men are stung by these strange, infernal creatures, they will cry out with pain.
But according to our lesson text the pain will not be sufficient to kill them, but it will be so severe that they will wish they could die. And their torment will be made even worse by the fact that they will not be permitted to die, for it says:
“In those days shall men seek death, and shall not find it, and shall desire to die, and death shall flee from them.”
Terrible things are happening throughout the world today and it common knowledge everywhere that men are committing suicide by hundred and thousands in order to escape from things which seem to them even worse than death!
Truly men’s hearts are failing them for fear of those things which are coming upon the world. But think if you can, what it will mean when men shall be tormented for five months by these locusts, which will sting like scorpions. And when this comes to pass, men will be unable to commit suicide. Today men can choose between life and death, but when that time comes the right of choice will be taken away, and even though men shall desire to die it says, “that death shall flee from them.”
There will be absolutely nothing therefore, for them to do but suffer during the five months until the end of this strange plague shall come. To Have a King
There is just one other thing about these locusts that we might mention, and that is, that they are to have a king over them. In Revelation 9:11 it says:
“They had a king over them, which is the angel of the bottomless pit, whose name in the Hebrew tongue is Abaddon, but in the Greek tongue, hath his name Apollyon.”
The word Abaddon we are told means “destruction” and the Greek word Apollyon means “destroyer.” Therefore, a king whose name stands for destruction is to rule over these locusts and direct their work during the five months so that it will be carried out in an orderly fashion.
These locusts therefore, will not be an unorganized mob of creatures, such as ordinarily locusts, who ravage and destroy without restraint, but they will carry on their work in an orderly fashion under the direction of their king.
What One Writer Says In his book on the Apocalypse, Seiss, speaking on this very point, says:
“It appears, then, that hell and hellish torments are not the mere fictions which some have pronounced them. Neither are they as remote from this present world as men often dream. There is a fiery abyss, with myriads of evil beings in it, malignant and horrible, and there is but a door between this world and that. Heaven is just as near; but heaven is above, and hell is beneath.
Mortal man and his world lie between two mighty, opposite, spiritual spheres, both touching directly upon him, each operative to conform him to itself, and he predestined, as he yields to one or the other, to be conjoined eventually to the society on high, or to companionship with devils and all evil beings beneath. To doubt this, is to mistake concerning the most momentous things of our existence, and to have all our senses closed to the most startling realities of our lives.
As we are heavenly in our inclinations and efforts, and open and yield to things Divine, heaven opens to us, and spirits of heaven become our helpers, comforters, protectors, and guides; and, as we are devilish in our temper, unbelieving, defiant of God, and self-sufficient, the doors of separation between us and hell gradually yield, und the smoke of the pit gathers over us, and the spirits of perdition come forth to move among us and do us mischief. And at the last, as the saints of God are taken up out of the world on the one side, the angels of hell with their malignity and torments are to be let in on the other.
People are prone to persuade themselves that this world of sense and time is all that we need be concerned about, and hence have no fears of an unseen world of evil, and no decided or active desire for the blessings of an unseen world of good. They live only for earth, not dreaming that this brief life is only the vestibule to worlds of mightier and eternal moment.
Their houses are built by the very margin of hell, and yet they rest and feast in them without a feeling of insecurity or of danger. The flame of perdition clamor after them beneath the pavements on which they walk, but they have no sense of fear or serious apprehension. God and angels are ever busy to win their attention to the ways of safety, but they turn a deaf ear and drift along as they list, crying, Peace! Peace!
And so will the wicked and the unbelieving go on, until ignored and offended Omnipotence gives over the power to Satan to let loose upon them these horrid beings from the abyss, under whose torment they will wish they never had lived at all, and vainly attempt to make their escape from what they once considered their chief and only good.
Hell is to be let in upon the living earth, and no human hand can stay its torments. And as the generations of the rebellious and the unsanctified, complete their five months of horror and writhing under the scorpion stings of these infernal tormentors, the first woe will be fulfilled, whilst yet two other and more horrible ones follow.
God Almighty, in His mercy, save us from the evils of those days!”
One Woe Past
Now in Revelation 9:12 of our lesson text it says: “One woe is passed; and, behold, there come two woes more hereafter.”
~ end of lecture 27 ~