Mike Bickle delivers a powerful sermon on the fifth trumpet from the book of Revelation, emphasizing the literal release of a demonic army of locusts from the bottomless pit, which will torment those without the seal of God. He explains that this torment will be so severe that people will seek death but will not find it, highlighting the sovereignty of God in allowing this judgment as a means to purify His church and call for repentance. Bickle encourages believers to understand the reality of these events and the importance of remaining steadfast in faith during such trials, as the church will be protected while the world faces torment.

Lord, we ask you to touch our spirit with it. Lord, we long that our spirit would be invigorated by the living Word. Speak it to us, Lord. We know that it takes God to hear from God, so God, the Holy Spirit, just release the oil of revelation on our spirits as we speak and hear the Word in Jesus' name. Amen. We're on the ninth message here in this series, covering the seven seals, the seven trumpets, and the seven bowls of wrath. We're going to continue several more messages on this series. Tonight, we're on the fifth trumpet, which is a torment of the human race by a army of demonic locusts that are released from the bottomless pit in a supernatural way. And I believe that this is a literal army of demonic locusts. It's a demonic army that afflicts the human race exactly like it says in the book of Revelation. So often, folks, they shy away from the book of Revelation because they don't understand the symbolism, but the secret is most of it isn't symbolism. It's just straightforward. And this is a classic chapter that's often symbolized and dismissed and just kind of written off as kind of prophetic poetry, and it's not. It absolutely means what it says. There will be an army released from the bottomless pit under the sovereignty of God that will inflict such torment upon the human race that do not have the seal of God upon them, that people will cry out for death. They will seek death. It'll be the greatest number and intensity of human beings, untold millions seeking to die. It's a very, very intense, dynamic, dramatic time that God is using to bring forth the great harvest and to bring forth His church in purity. Let's read about this demonic locust plague, this army loosed from the bottomless pit itself from Revelation chapter 9 verse 1 to 11. Then the fifth angel sounded. The fifth trumpet sound is released in the spirit. They're blowing their trumpets before God, and John says, I saw a star fallen from heaven to the earth. And this star is an angel, and to him, it's not an actual star. It's made clear the star is a person or a being. To him, it's an angel, was given the key to the bottomless pit. There is a bottomless pit, and it has a lock on it, and it has a key that opens it. And this angel, this star that descended from heaven, he opened the bottomless pit. That is one of the most terrifying phrases in the Bible. When the angel opens the bottomless pit with that great key, and what happens when the bottomless pit is unlocked, this great prison house is unlocked. It's a prison. The bottomless pit is described in the scripture as a place of confinement for fallen angels or demons. Second Peter 2 talks about it, verse 4. Jude verse 6 or 7 talks about angels that are bound and imprisoned in confinement, and it is the bottomless pit. That the scripture is talking about. Anyway, verse 2, this angel opens the bottomless pit, and the first thing that happens, literally happens, smoke arose out of the pit like the smoke of a great furnace. Now the first question you have is, where is this pit? It's somewhere. There will be an opening on the earth. I wouldn't spend any time trying to figure it out. You know, there's always those kind of strange folk that are gonna go find it. I wouldn't, because you can't, and you're really glad you can't. That's a good thing that you can't. Anyway, this great shaft, there will be a great opening in the earth, and out of it, smoke will come, like billows of smoke, like a great furnace. And I would underline the word great. Undoubtedly, the amount of smoke is beyond anything we can imagine. Anything that we're thinking right now, I'm sure it's way beyond that. So much so that the sun and the air were darkened because of the smoke from the pit. I don't know if you've ever been in a smoke-filled area where a great fire, where the smoke not only is the sunlight block, but the air is poisoned itself. The very air is toxic, and it's horrible, horrible. It's a very, very dreadful feeling. I'm sure most of you have experienced at least a little bit of it, of that kind of impact of smoke. This is smoke straight out of the bottomless pit. It's a toxic, poisonous smoke. I'm adding that to it. I'm guessing it is. Scripture doesn't say it, but I just got a feeling it's not a good smoke. Verse 3, and out of this great furnace of smoke, this pillars of smoke coming forth from this opening in the earth, out of it comes forth locusts. Now, they're demons, and they come upon the earth. And to these, locusts was given power. It was given by God. God is the three times in this passage. Of course, it happens all through the book of Revelation. There's this unexpressed agent who's giving permission to either angels or demons to act, and it's always God behind the event. It's God's permission that is allowing these things to happen. But that phrase, you see it all through the book of Revelation. It is given. It has been granted. It has been allowed. It's that kind of language. And the unexpressed agent that's giving it is God himself. It's his sovereignty. It's fully in operation and in manifestation in the midst of this most terrifying plague of demons. Verse 3, then out of the smoke, locusts came, and to them was given. There it is again. It's given. It's mentioned three times in this passage. Power. Power was given to these locusts. And John goes on to describe the type of power, the nature of the power. He said it was like a scorpion or is as a scorpion. It wasn't exactly a scorpion's power, but that's under the anointing of the spirit. That's the closest he could come to defining what he saw. It was like a scorpion sting. It was as the scorpions of the earth have power. And of course, the power a scorpion has is to sting and torment. Scorpions don't typically kill. They can kill infants, but they don't typically kill. They torment in the most severe way. And so these locusts were given power to torment in the most intense way. Verse 4, they are commanded. There it is. It's this unexpressed agent directing the affairs. Commanded by who? It doesn't tell us. But again, this language is used so often in the book of Revelation. It's, it's, it's, it's meant to be understood as coming from the throne of God. So they're given power, but verse 4, they're limited in the scope of their power. There's boundaries on what they can do. They're commanded to do several things. They can't harm the grass or green things or trees because locusts normally do that. Natural locusts do that. And maybe these demon locusts, you know, have, are acclimated in that direction. I don't know. It seems so because they're commanded not to touch them. But they're commanded only to touch the men who do not have the seal of God upon their forehead. Now, if there was ever a time to take the book of Revelation at the utmost literal, women, it's this hour. It's only gonna touch men, it possibly means humans, but if there's any doubt, just get the seal of God through Jesus Christ. You're gonna be fine anyway. Okay. Verse 5, and they were not given authority. Here it is again, this unexpressed agent of action, this, this one that's not giving them authority, the one that's determining this. He doesn't give them authority to kill, but only to torment for five months. And the five months is literal. There's no reason in this passage to, there's nothing in the text that leads us to any, any reason to make this symbolic. And of course, there's certainly no historical fulfillment of this five month period. It is literal and it's future. So there's all kinds of boundary lines upon these locusts. They can't touch the grass. They can't touch believers. They can't kill number three. And, uh, uh, they can, uh, and their sting continues for five months. So those are the boundary lines. They can't touch the grass. They can't touch believers. They can't kill. And the sting of this, this scorpion like sting won't hurt for several days like a natural scorpion. Cause this is this five months is bad news because the scorpion sting normally hurts several days really bad, but this goes on and on and on like 150 days, not three or four or five days, but 150 days verse five continues. Their torment was like the torment of a scorpion. When it strikes a man, John's the second time he says that John is, uh, is, uh, emphasizing this reality. And again, the, the, uh, commentators that take their liberties and they dismiss these details that John is emphasizing. I just don't feel that it's, uh, we have any right to do that. And I believe it's a disservice to the body of Christ to dismiss these details. These are real and they're meant to be understood because they're going to be very, very important for the saints to understand what is happening in this day. This will be one of the most confusing hours of human history is when that angel opens that bottomless pit, that great billows of smoke come out and this army of locusts begin to come and descend across the earth. They sting men for five months with pain and the torment. There must be a clear prophetic interpretation. There must be a clear prophetic trumpet in the midst of this fifth trumpet is to give understanding as to what men have found this, what is going on and what is the way out of this dilemma because men still can repent. So be the one that more than the most significant assignments of the body of Christ is to bring clarity and understanding in this very hour, right here in the, in the fifth trumpet. Is this what I'll talk to you later. How's that? That's my buddy, Rocky. Okay. Rocky, we'll chat a little bit later. How's that? Okay, good. Give me the thumbs up. Okay. Verse five, their torment was like the torment of a scorpion when it strikes a man. Verse six, and in those days, and then it's a literal time frame. In those days, men will seek death. There will be this, I mean, I'm told millions of people wanting to commit suicide or wanting to die. And they're trying to bring death upon themselves because not because they're afraid of God at this point in time, because they are in such anguish over the pain of the, of the scorpion. See in the sixth seal, if you remember the sixth seal, revelation six, verse 12 to 17, they went to the mountains and asked for the mountains to crush them. They sought death already once, but they were seeking death because they were terrified of God. Now it here, it is some months later, possibly even a year or so later. You don't really know, but sometime later, not very long, you know, a month to several months to a year or so now they're seeking death again. This is the second time men are seeking death in the book of revelation and believers, but this time it's not in terror of God, but it's an anguish over the scorpion sting. They will desire to die, but death, what a phrase death is, is racing away from them, fleeing from them. The picture John gives is, is, is death running fast and they're chasing death and they cannot, they cannot get, catch the spirit of death to have it do its work upon them. The spirit of death will not cooperate with them. Their bodies in so much anguish, but somewhere in the mystery of God, the spirit of death, the angel of death, angels and demons are involved and spirits are involved in a person's physical death. And these, and they, and it's like in, revelation six, eight, uh, death is taking, uh, working and Hades is chasing death. Now natural men are chasing death. First Hades was chasing death in chapter six, verse eight. Now we have natural men on the earth, chasing death with anguish in their bodies. They cannot get the spirit of death to cooperate with them. They're laying in anguish, crying out and they can't die because there it's, uh, again, there's a supernatural dimension involving angels and demons. I don't claim to have precise understanding of it, but the devil, but the scriptures clear there's, there's a involvement of the spirit realm and a person's physical death and that the spirit realm, both both sides, angels and demons will not cooperate in releasing them. I don't know how far this goes. Someone says, you know, maybe they just go jump off a bridge. Maybe they saw somebody who did and they're laying there. They just can't quite die. Maybe they said, you know, I'm not going to do that. I don't know how it works, but I know this, the human race concludes it doesn't work and they're in great anguish. Okay. Verse seven to 11 now goes on to describe these demonic locusts. It gives eight different components or eight different descriptions. They they're like horses prepared for battle. Their heads are crowned with something like gold. Their faces like the faces of men, their hair like women's hair, their teeth like lion's teeth, breastplates like of iron. Their wings had the sound of chariots running into battle. The wing, I mean the sound of the wings, they have wings was terrifying. The tail was like a scorpion and they're the sting in their tail. That's the third time that John emphasizes the scorpion sting. Their power to hurt was five months. Again, he repeats this. He wants it to be understood and taken serious and to be taken literal. In verse 11, they had as a king over them, the angel of the bottomless pit, part of the satanic hierarchy. There's this angel called Abaddon and Apollyon. That's the Hebrew and the Greek name because John wants the two languages that he is ministering to in that day to understand fully what is going on. And both in both languages, it means the same thing. It means destroyer or destroying. Okay, let's look at Roman numeral one. Review of the first four trumpets. I'll just read a couple of these paragraphs that the students have in notes and the interns. The blowing of the seven trumpets, this is review, parallels the pouring out of the seven bowls of wrath. The seven trumpets and the seven bowls of wrath have parallels together. They are not the same events, but they have parallels. They are an eschatological application of the ten plagues of Egypt or an in-time application of what Moses released and we looked at that at the last session. However, the ten plagues were mostly punitive. There were some in Egypt who feared the Lord. There were some that feared the Lord and they obeyed Moses on a occasion or two. Those that feared the Lord and it says also some among the Egyptians left Egypt and went into the desert with Israel. There were, in our terminology, converts. There were those that said yes and followed the ways of God. However, the trumpets, they have a three-fold purpose. Number one, they are punitive. They have, they are punishment on unbelievers for killing the saints. This is God's zeal for the people being martyred. They are significantly punitive. They are, they are punishment. But number two, they are redemptive because trumpets by the very choice of the trumpets to release them. Trumpets blast are warning of coming calamity so that people can avoid the calamity. There is a warning dimension to the trumpets that is redemptive, meaning so that unbelievers can respond at the very last hour here. We're at the very last hour, respond in a right way. And number three, they are a vindication and victory to God's people, to the saints. They're, they, the trumpets bring victory to the people of God. And I will, uh, say it, uh, add another dimension. They, the trumpets in the Old Testament rallied the people of God. And when these trumpet blasts go in the fifth trumpet, the sixth trumpet go forth the house of prayer. And I'm gonna talk about our little thing here. I'm talking about the global reality called the house of prayer will be at its all time high. The trumpet of God will call people into the global solemn assemblies and the house of prayer will be at strongest of any time in history. When the trumpet blast just like this is very parallel, intentionally parallel to Joel chapter two, the locust plague in Joel chapter two was a natural locust plague. It's a great crisis, the locust plague of Joel one and Joel two. And then it was the invading army of the Babel, the Babylonian army coming in and disaster like locusts. And then here, so we have the literal locust plague in Joel one, we have the Babylonian army locust plague in Joel two, and we have them pointing to this demonic locust plague here in revelation nine. And they're all parallel. And we are to understand from the book of Joel how to respond. And the church will respond. They will gather in solemn assemblies all over the earth and cry out as the trumpet blast goes and God's protection will break in. So there's a rallying dimension to these trumpets. They will bring great encouragement to the church. B, in the trumpet warnings, Jesus is graciously calling unbelievers to repent. As severe as these are, we find out that the majority of the unbelievers don't repent. So as severe as it is, it still does not wake up the majority of the earth. C, there's the rallying, the righteous, there's an encouragement dimension. I've already mentioned that. Okay. D, the first four trumpet judgments we looked at a couple of weeks ago, the first four trumpets, the first, second, third, fourth trumpet, uh, they are, they, they are aimed at destroying nature. The first four trumpets of the hell. And then the sea becoming blood and the rivers becoming blood and the sun being dark in the first four trumpets, they touch nature or they touch the life support systems of the planet, but they don't actually touch people directly. People are greatly impacted. And even they die in the third trumpet by drinking some of that water, but it doesn't, it touches the, the, uh, the elements of nature, the life support systems, but the fifth and sixth trumpet, they change gears and now they're aimed directly at humans, touching them in a direct way. And I mean, the whole thing, the end time judgments go up to a whole nother level with the fifth and sixth trumpet. They are directly afflicting humans by demons, touching humans. And in the fifth trumpet, they don't kill them, but they great pain for five months. And in the sixth trumpet, they do kill them one third of the earth demons. And that's what we're going to look at in our next session. Now, this fifth trumpet, uh, goes back. It references a revelation eight 13, just the verse before a revelation nine. And, uh, there's an angel flying in the mid heaven and the angel says, Whoa, Whoa, Whoa, to the inhabitants of the earth because of the remaining blast of the trumpets of the three angels. So when the angel, uh, flies in the midst of the, of the heavens, it goes, Whoa, Whoa, Whoa. Each woe is the, is the fifth trumpet, the sixth trumpet and the seventh trumpet. And that's what's meant to be understood. But notice in chapter eight, verse 13, when the angel says, Whoa, Whoa, Whoa, we know that the intensity is about to increase. And it really does with the first woe or the fifth trumpet, the second woe, which is the sixth trumpet. And the third woe, which is the seventh trumpet, the level of intensity goes significantly higher, but look what it says. Whoa, to the inhabitants of the earth. We know that it's not on the elements of the earth. It's the inhabitants. Now it's humans being directly touched and notice also it's the inhabitants of the earth, not just of Israel or the Mediterranean area. It's the whole planet that is under this. Whoa, it's the inhabitants of the entire globe. And the reason that they are in trouble is because the, the, the fifth, sixth and seventh trumpets, the three remaining trumpets are about to sound again. This has not happened anytime in history. When I find commentators that try to make sense of these locusts that stink for five months with their tails and the symbolism, I mean, it, it, it see, it just seems really, uh, really unconvincing, really unconvincing. Roman numeral two, here's a, uh, turn to page two. This is a very important premise behind the fifth and the sixth trumpet. The demons are answering their loyal worshipers with torment. This is a, this is going to create a paradigm shift on the planet in one way. I mean, it's going to change many things that the, the, the emotional and spiritual dynamics behind the fifth and sixth trumpet are just they're massive in their importance. We'll look at this in a few moments. Hey, the fifth and sixth trumpets released two different demonic armies on the earth. And the earth is, is filled with Satan worship. The earth is filled far, far more than, than now the, the satanic occult sorcery dimensions of the planet right now are definitely on a fast, uh, increase, but they are going to increase far, far beyond anything we know. Now there's going to be two demonic armies. The first demonic armies is here versus one to 11, the locusts. And they're on, we don't know the number. We know there's a lot of them because they're tormenting the people of I mean, undoubtedly millions of them. We don't know, but the next demonic army is, is, is in verse 13 on the, all the way to 21. And that's a demonic horsemen, 200 million of them. So there's two demonic armies, two separate armies, two, two different flanks, uh, or ranks of Satan's armies are going to be loosed upon the planet. And they're assigned by God. They're waiting with, with blood lost and anger and torment in their being. I mean, desire to torment is in flaming them, waiting for the day that's prepared the hour prepared. As it says, uh, later on in revelation nine, there's a day and an hour and a month and a year prepared for this demonic horseman. That, that that's the next session. I won't go there now, but these two demonic armies are released upon an earth that is filled with Satan worship. Let's read revelation 13, verse three says all the world marveled and followed the beast. That's the antichrist. Now look, it says verse four, they worshiped the dragon. That's Satan. They worshiped the beast. That's the antichrist. Here's what they said. Who is like the beast? I mean, they are extolling the marvels of this demonic man. Verse eight says it again, all who dwell on the earth worship this man, the antichrist, except people with their names written in the book of life. Verse 12, the false prophet causes the earth to worship the beast. It says it over and over verse four, they worship Satan and the beast verse eight, all the earth worships the beast verse 12, the false prophet causes the earth to worship the beast. The earth is filled with demon worship. Then we'll go back to revelation nine and verse 20. It says that after these plagues, the most surprising thing takes place. And this is why we don't understand the severity of God's judgment, because we don't understand the nature of what's going on in the nature of the sin and lodged in man's heart. Because after these judgments, instead of repenting in revelation nine, verse 20, it says the rest of mankind, the ones who didn't die, they, they did not repent and they went back to worshiping demons. It's like, it's like, am I missing something? And the answer is yes, you are. You don't understand the mystery of lawlessness, the mystery of iniquity, how sin works so powerfully in the human heart, even in the presence of all this supernatural activity, the good supernatural activity of God, because the, because the saints are being protected and the unbelievers can see it and the unbelievers are being tormented by the demons. They worship. They're turning on the people. The demons are turning on them and striking them with swords. And then in the fifth trumpet and then death in the sixth B now is the time the last year or two before the second coming of Christ. Now is the time that the demons come to answer. I want you to catch this. They answer the worship and intercession movement of darkness. The, the people all over the earth have been worshiping. Worship and intercession has been going on in the kingdom of darkness, worshiping demons, talking to demons, serving demons. So demons are now going to answer their prayers and the people thinking, Hey, we've given our heart, our money, our time. We've, we've, you know, we've been tithing, double tithing, fasting days, praying, worshiping you. What good things will you bring us? And Satan shows his utter disdain and hatred of the men that worship him. It's very disillusioning for real. I'm talking about to the demon worshipers because they come face to face with the true nature of the kingdom of darkness. They're going, wait, no, wait a second. We worship you. You don't understand. Maybe you didn't grasp it. We love you. We give you our money, our service, our time. We killed Christians for you. Certainly there is good that will come out of this. God lifts the restraints that he and his goodness has put on demons and lets the demons answer the worship and prayer movement of darkness. And they come to them. They're, they're praying in essence, calm, calm. They're, they're doing the exact counterfeit of what we're doing with Jesus. Come, let us know, you know, your power, let us experience you. And then the demons come and torment the planet and the body of Christ, the prophets of God. I'm dumping the whole body of Christ in this prophetic spirit. There will still be prophets, but there will be such a strong prophetic spirit. We will be speaking the body. I'm talking in the generic sense, the body of Christ with such clarity as to what's happening in that hour. There'll be neighbors that will be going, what is going on? And we will unfold the book of revelation and explain to them the nature of their prayer movement and the nature of what happens when those they cry out to come actually come. So it's the reversal of the prayer worship movement. It's absolutely terrifying. Okay. See the demons all along have hated and despised humans. See, they don't just despise believers. They despise unbelievers. They despise these fallen image bearers in the image of God. Humans bear the image of God. They hate humans. They even hate the humans that worship them. They only have one capacity, torment, hatred. We say, why is the Lake of fire forever? The Lord says, you have no idea of the depth and the permanent state of their hatred towards me and towards people. We don't want demons set free and forgiven because the demon spirit is permanently with an infinite depth of hatred established in it. Now we don't fully understand that it's called in second Timothy, second Thessalonians. I mean, chapter two, verse seven, the mystery of sin, the mystery of lawlessness. There's a depth, there's a permanency, there's a power to it. It's beyond what we understand the great delusion in the nations. And it really will be a time of disillusionment. I mean, I'm not just adding that into this. There will be a confusion and a disillusionment that, that is going to, I believe, create opportunity for the word of God to go forth and power. Again, the vast majority of the human race will not respond, but it's very, very clear. There will be people responding. It's very clear. If you put all the prophetic scriptures together, it's very clear. There are, there is a great harvest coming in during this time. The great delusion in the nations is that they assumed that in return for worshiping Satan for worshiping the antichrist or worshiping demons, they assumed they would receive favor. They would receive goodness of some sort, some advantage. Satan never rewards his worshipers. Never. We play with darkness. Sin appears as a bright shining sun right in front of us, but beloved, it is always a dark, dark, dismal night. It's a falling star that fades and leaves us in the loneliness and despair of utter darkness. Always. Whether we're dancing with darkness in the overt way of demon worship or we're just flirting with darkness with compromise, sin appears as a bright shining sun, star beckoning us to come. It always leaves us in the darkness and the loneliness and despair of the dark night. Always. It's always a lie. Many of these men took the mark of the beast condemned to hell now. And here's, here is the absolute horror of horrors. They will be in hell with demons that hate them with a perfect hatred. They will be in the bottom, they will be in hell, eventually all in the lake of fire because all those in the bottomless pit will be thrown in the lake of fire. They will, these men stung by these locusts will be in the lake of fire with these locusts. Again, the demons they worship are the demons that hate them are the demons that will dwell with them forever. Oh, I can't even fathom the utter horror of what this is talking about. It is true. We cannot fathom to the total surprise of these demon worshipers. I'm at the end of C demons have no loyalty at all. None, zero, none. And that's part of our message. There's only one who is faithful and true and it's not demons. They are the opposite of faithful and true. They lie every time. That's part of our message. They hate, they hate demon worshipers as much as they hate Christians. And that, that is, that is incomprehensible to demon worshipers. D the nature of Satan's hatred is now openly manifest because see, it's not been openly manifest until the fifth trumpet all through history. Satan's true nature has been hidden, but the fifth and sixth trumpet, the first two woes openly shows the truth of Satan to the planet and they go, Oh, he's bad. I mean, I mean, I'm thinking in the, in a very limited sense, but it's a graphic of the loyal followers, followers, the abs fanatic, loyal followers of Adolf Hitler. And then the last months of the war, his most loyal men hated him with a passion. The men that loved him the most hated him with a perfect passion. And many of them tried to murder him. And of course he found out and he murdered them, his most loyal companions from all the years. They found the truth of who this man was. They hated him and they hated each other. Now those guys will be in hell, hating each other too. It's horrifying. Satan is a murder from the beginning. Jesus said in John 8 44, 8 44, he says he's a murder from the beginning. He is the father of lies. He murders and lies from the beginning till the end. He never changes. No agreement with the devil can ever be kept. He will break every agreement, every agreement. So he, I mean this for real, this, this sounds kind of like a little bit like tongue and cheek, but the demonic worshipers will be greatly disillusioned with the demons. They're worshiping again. It's like the Adolf Hitler, uh, loyalists, uh, at the very last they hated him. They were so disillusioned with him and, uh, they will hate the demons they worship. And this is God's expose of the kingdom of darkness before the second coming. God gives an expose on the kingdom. He exposes them. You know how he lets them have freedom to do what they want. And that exposes them to the whole world. He doesn't violate the free will. He just takes his restraint off. God is restraining the demons in a level that we cannot comprehend. He will expose, it will be a great divine expose. The fifth trumpet and the fifth suit. I mean the fifth trumpet and the sixth trumpet, the first two woes, God takes his hand off of them and lets them be who they are. He sets them free to act. Let's go to F in context to the fifth and six trumpets. God reveals it's in the, it's in these two trumpets. So we'll look at the sixth trumpet next time he reveals the mystery of lawlessness. And here's the mystery of lawlessness. And I have it in the, in this text there, he reveals the mystery of lawlessness from second Thessalonians two, uh, I'm at two seven. It says, uh, that for the mystery of lawlessness is already at work now, but it's going to be fully revealed when the restraints are removed. And this mystery here is the mystery of lawlessness in one sentence. It's that Satan's evil is manifest as evil. They see the evil, the wickedness of Satan, and they see the power of God because the saints who are being killed by these, this evil company of people, billions strong of, of evil people pursuing the saints to kill the saints. The saints are in bright righteousness. The saints have a seal. They're being protected, not from persecution. Every time, certainly not by any means, all sometimes there's divine protection from the persecution, great miracles related to persecution, but we're protected fully from wrath fully. So it's like the children of, of Israel in Goshen, which we talked about last week, the plagues are breaking out, but there's one company of people called the body of Christ where the plagues do not touch their dwelling. Psalm 91 to the fullness. And the unbelievers are, they see the rage of Satan against them, uh, uh, filling their bodies with, with the sting and this pain and tormenting their children. And yet they look across the street and they see the believers with radiant righteousness, humility, fearless before death, divine protection. The sting doesn't touch any one of them. They have signs and wonders. They're prophesying with clarity as to what's going on. And in the midst of the open display of the depth of darkness and the open display of the power of God, they will choose darkness with their own free will. That's the mystery of lawlessness. See, that's what in second Thessalonians two, I, I touched this some, maybe a year ago, we spent a message on this, that the mystery of lawlessness, the reason we don't understand the book of revelations, because we don't understand the problem. We don't understand the severe means because we don't understand the severe problem. We don't understand the depth of the human hatred towards God. Neither. We don't understand the means, the severity of the book of revelation, because we don't also understand the height of glory. God's bringing the church who will under this pressure volunteer set for such radical obedience before the second coming, because it's important that it's decided on by individuals beforehand. And they walk in and the righteousness and the most extreme situation on the earth. And it's the job scenario played out and they choose God. And we cannot understand the magnitude of that glory, nor can we understand the magnitude of the problem of sin in the heart and the mystery of how one man chooses this way. And one man chooses the other. It's called a mystery. God understands it, but he says, don't accuse me because you don't understand the depth of the problem of the human heart. You don't know how much they hate me and you don't know how great the glory is I've prepared. So trust me that my means of bringing it all to the surface is not exaggerated. It is wisdom and love motivated. So the mystery of lawlessness, we find it in verse 20. We've already read it in chapter nine, verse 20. They did not repent, but they kept worshiping demons. Verse 21, they did not repent. And then we find it second Thessalonians two. I have it on the notes second Thessalonians two. It's a couple of verses past the mystery of lawlessness, same chapter, a couple of verses down because these people would not receive as a gift, the anointing of truth called the love of the truth. It's a gift that we receive it. We can't earn it. We can't well it up. We can't drum it up. We can't stir it up. We can position ourself by choosing righteousness in the grace of God. And we can receive this increasing anointing called the love of the truth because these people would not receive this enabling anointing called the love of the truth. For this reason, God gave them the strong delusion. They would believe the lie. It's the lie here. They believe it's better to go with demons than it is to go with God. There's the great lie. They, it's, it's satanically, uh, uh, uh, the, the origin of it is in darkness, but God takes his hand out of the way and allows the spirit of delusion to work fully and bring them into the place where they, they are tormented by the demons. They worship and they still choose the demons again. That's called the great lie. Okay. Let's look at H and the first four seals and the first four seals. What God did, he lifted his hand off of humans, right? He took his restraint off of human sin. The first four seals, not trumpets, the seals, God took his hand off of humans and let humans express their rage. But in the fifth and sixth trumpet, he takes his hand off of demons and he lets them express their rage and the seals. He, the first four seals, he takes the restraints and men show their wickedness in the fifth and sixth trumpet. He takes his hand, his gracious, restraining hand off the demonic realm, part of it, and demons show their true nature. Okay, let's go to Roman numeral three, Roman numeral three, the fifth trumpet. We'll just take a minute. We kind of went through a few of the details and you got the notes here. A holy angel, a, I believe this, this, this star fallen from heaven. Another translation is the word descending from heaven, descending from heaven. I believe this is a good angel who's descending. You can use the word falling, descending or coming from heaven. So I believe it's a good angel. And the reason I believe that because the word fall or descending, it's the same idea. It's the parallel passage of this is a revelation chapter 20, where an obvious good angel does the same thing, descends from heaven with the key to the bottomless pit given to him. It's the same exact activity descends from heaven, comes down from heaven, is given the key to the bottomless pit. And he's the one that incarcerates Satan. So it's not a little demon incarcerating Satan. I assure you that it's a holy angel incarcerating Satan. There's no demon God uses to put Satan in prison. God doesn't violate his own higher. I mean, uh, the, the, the hierarchy of Satan that Satan had in heaven that now is transferred to hell. Uh, when he fell as Lucifer, that hierarchy is still in place. And so the key to understanding this, the star fallen, it's not a man. It's not simple as a star. It's an angel descending from heaven. Uh, I, uh, some commentators see this as a fallen angel and that's, that's, uh, certainly doesn't cause disturb, uh, anything important. It could be a fallen angel, but I think when you compare this passage to revelation 20 verse one to three, the exact same language, it's obviously a holy angel who descends from heaven and is given the key and opens the bottomless pit. So there's a star that's fallen now in the scripture, uh, the, even in the book of revelation on a number of occasions, a star is an angel. It says it because Jesus says it, it says it, uh, it's not symbolism. We're guessing Jesus actually interprets it in the word chapter one, verse 20, the stars, their angels. And it says in several places I have here, stars personify angels. The scripture makes clear the scripture. Okay. B this star, it either falls or descends. If this angel is, is, is, is a good angel, then it's descending. If it's a fallen angel, you know, he fell in judgment, then it's an evil one, but I believe it's a good one. Again, that it's not that germane to the, uh, to the tax, but I just, that's just my opinion of it. Let's go to top of page four. Okay. D these locusts, these demonic locusts. And I mean, if there's 200 million horsemen in the next plague, there's probably a comparable number of hundreds of millions. We don't know, but to me, it's very, very believable. It's a, it's an, it's a innumerable host of demonic beings. They're supernatural beings. They have a supernatural origin mean they come from the pit from the bottomless pit and the word, the abyss or the bottomless pit is the exact same. It's the same, uh, word. One translation calls it abyss because that's, uh, the Greek word is, is, uh, uh, close to the word abyss and others just translate it and say bottomless pit. So this angel I'm assuming is a good angel opens the bottomless pit and then the bad angels come out. This smoke of a fire comes out. Now the bottomless pit in the scripture is clearly, it is not the lake of fire. The lake of fire is the final place of judgment for Satan and the fallen angels. This is a, a, a, a place of incarceration. This is a place of confinement. This is a prison house before the lake of fire. Scripture, uh, says that in several places, number two, there is a large, a huge shaft extending from the earth surface to somewhere down in the depths of the earth. The bottomless pit is a deep, dark place with untold millions and millions of demons down there. And it has a opening on the earth that is locked. And again, it would be absolute foolishness for someone to try to find it. And again, their worst nightmare would be if they did find it, but they won't, but it's such to where a angel opens it and this door is open and the demons come out and smoke is seen in the natural. So it has a opening on the surface of the earth somewhere. Number three, in this bottomless pit, in this big prison house, I mean, it is massive and it's enough for hundreds of millions of demons to be it. I mean, my guess, you know, I don't really know all this stuff, but my guess is there's, there's a lot more demons than there are humans. You know, there's angels for, for every believer. I mean, for every person there's angels. I mean, there's the hosts are probably way beyond what we know. Anyway, the numbers down in this prison are just probably staggering. There's no way we know for sure, but in that bottomless pit is where the antichrist dwells. It says it in chapter 11, verse seven and chapter 17, verse eight, that out of the abyss, the same word out of the bottomless pit, he ascends out of the bottomless pit for his earthly function. He comes from this place, the man called the antichrist. Now the question is, how long is he in that place? Is he in there, you know, the few days that he died after the head wound? Is he in there for a few years? Is he in there? How long is he in there? I don't know, but any man that's hanging out in the bottomless pit that comes to the earth is, is bad news. I don't know how long he's there, but it's bad news. I'm going to say it again, twice in the book of Revelation, it makes clear that the antichrist in the demonic spirit dimension of his personhood, and there's a certain mystery to his personhood, because it seems like he's fully demonized. He's fully human for sure, but it seems like there's a dimension of him that is either fully demon or he's demonized fully. It's hard to say the language is precise, and I want to be dogmatic where the scripture isn't, but he's down there. There, there is the, uh, there's the demonic king. Abaddon is down there, the king of this locust. He's down there too, probably, and all the demon locusts, millions and millions, probably the 200 million horsemen are there. That's a guess, but that's probably a good guess. And second Peter chapter two talks about the spirits in prison down there. And first Peter three talks about it too, spirits that are in prison. Okay. Number four, this angel, I assume is a good angel. It could be a bad, a fallen angel. It could, the word fallen might mean fallen from this, from the heaven, but I think it means descending from the heaven is the idea, not the translation of it. I'm talking about the idea of it. So this good angel comes down at the time of God, opens the smoke explodes. Now this exploding smoke is prophesied by Joel. Joel said in chapter two, verse 30, that when the great signs and wonders broke out, there would be pillars of smoke. This, that would be one of the great signs of the end times. I don't believe it's one column of smoke, you know, somewhere in Israel. I think it's smoke. I believe this, the fifth trumpet is one, not by any means the only one, because there's so many of the trumpets have fire in them and the fire descends from heaven and the trees are burning. Smoke is everywhere. Poisonous toxic smoke is one of the great signs, one of the great burdens of the planet in the generation the Lord returns. I'm in those final hours, those final years is what I mean. K.E., out of the smoke comes a demonic army of locusts. F, the characteristics of these locusts make it clear. I have four things in F. I'm not going to go through them now, but make it clear they are not natural locusts. They are supernatural beings. I give four reasons in F. Why? You know, there's more besides, but just in the limitation of a handout. G, the demonic locusts are given permission by God. Again, and three times they are granted permission. They are commanded to do this and that. That God's sovereignty is being purposefully displayed and emphasized. God is saying I'm not unaware. I'm not inactive. I am fully attuned to this dilemma and it's serving my purposes and it fulfills justice. Number two, under G, the seal of God, there's a divine seal. Now the seal of God in Revelation 7 is specified in 144,000, but the seal of God here in chapter 9, verse 4, it's not limited to 144,000. I believe the seal of God in verse 4 is the body of Christ. It goes beyond the 144,000 of chapter 7. The 144,000 of chapter 7 are specifically Jewish uh Jewish people, believer, I mean gonna become believers and I believe that the seal here in verse 4 is larger in its parameters than that. It's like the Goshen dimension in the land of Egypt. Here's interesting. I have a verse here in number three. Jesus said this and oh how this is going to have such application in Luke 10, verse 19. He says, behold I give you authority to trample serpents. That's the uh the serpents. That's the tail of the horsemen in the next plague, the sixth trumpet, the one that kills a third of the earth. They have tails like serpents that bite. So we have serpents in the sixth trumpet and we have we have scorpions in the fifth trumpet and Jesus looks at him. He goes, I want to give you a promise. I will give you authority over scorpions and serpents and of course that's been applicable for 2,000 years but beloved this is going to have a dynamic application on these sealed believers in verse 4 as they operate in the psalm 91 authority over scorpions and serpents. Not it says look at this you will I'll give you authority over serpents and scorpions over all the power. It's not just the the natural scorpions and serpents. It's the supernatural demonic ones too. All of them. A-L-L. I praise God for the word all. It was exactly the right order, the right place because it's the spiritual uh serpents and scorpions too. H. Authority is given to them to torment men for five months and and no one knows for sure what the five months is. I the five months is literal. I think it's it's really gets uh out there when when the commentators try to make it symbolic and fulfill it history. It's so such a stretch. It's beyond uh it's it's beyond credibility. It just means what it says but the uh normal uh locusts uh uh uh pillaging the the areas of a geographic area would be uh in would be from May to September. It's a five-month period of time and so somewhere there's a corresponding dimension. I don't know. Okay. I. Men will seek suicide. They will seek to die and the reason is to escape the pain we talked about. It's not it's different than than the sixth seal when they were running to the mountains to run from God and death is running from them. They're chasing death. Oh my goodness. What a in both situations the sixth seal and the fifth trumpet men are crying out for death. Soon their prayer is going to be answered because of the sixth trumpet in a minute is going to be blown and one-third of the earth will die unnatural deaths. Their cry we want to die in the in the sixth seal. Their cry we want to die in the fifth trumpet. It's going to be answered in a measure they cannot imagine. The greatest death toll in history is in the sixth trumpet. The next one okay page six. We'll just do this just ever so fast and Murray Murray you can come on up. It describes the locust army and it gives uh eight different characteristics of the locust army. We have it in a and b. We just kind of sum it up there. They have crowns on their head like gold which speak of their supremacy. This is an army that is has a has uh uh an element of uh they are crowned. They are uh an invincible army except god brings them down. This is no second-rate attack of satan. These are demons with crowns that god has allowed them to wear. They have faces like men which emphasizes the human intelligence. The the human emotion meaning there's a human dimension to these demons. There's not like they're machines. They're like they're real beings with real emotions and rage and intelligence. Hair like women. I I'm only understanding my only thought of that. I've never found any. I've read it from uh numbers of places nobody made any sense of it. It's just that my idea is that the demons would have long hair and in this case it'd be terrifying. F. I didn't say mourning hair or anything. I just said terrifying. Okay. F. Teeth like lion which would devour although they don't use their teeth but they're terrifying and they're destructive. Breast plates like iron which speaks of their durability their invincibility against attack. There is it's the the it's not like the nations are going to get together you know the antichrist go hey you guys settle down this is my army you're wiping out these are my guys and they all say we hate you too matter of fact we hate each other they all hate each other there's no human means to stop them they have breastplates like iron they are invincible to stop it by natural means the only one that could stop him is the king of kings the captain of the armies of heaven they have wings like a locust but they have a terrifying sound and they're the wings of military aggression the sound of military aggression is what i mean and they have tails like scorpions and they have a demonic king there is a divine i mean there is a there is an order and there is an authority there's a there's a rank and government in the structure of this army they have actually have a king and his name means destroyer and the whole of this i mean it is i mean it is so parallel with joel chapter one and chapter two of which the only answer was the solemn assembly the only answer to this plague will be the solemn assembly amen let's stand i just want to invite anyone that would like prayer for anything just in your heart you're saying lord i want to i want to give myself to you it's it's a time to break my alliance with darkness i want to break my alliances with darkness i want to be in the place of growing in light or maybe you're in a struggle in a circumstance you want someone to agree in prayer with you for a breakthrough of god maybe physically financially relationally maybe you want to come and rededicate yourself to the lord you want the lord to just touch your heart anybody that wants prayer come on up to the lion's hair returning like the wind