The Second Woe

Revelation 9: 12-21

(12) The first woe is past, behold, two woes are still coming after these things.

This was the opening of the bottomless pit that released the unspeakable evil that had been locked away from humanity. Now there will be two more.

(13) Then the sixth angel sounded, and I heard a voice from the four horns of the golden altar which is before God, 
(14) one saying to the sixth angel who had the trumpet, "Release the four angels who are bound at the great River Euphrates." 

Since these angels were tied up, they must be very powerful demons. 

(15) And the four angels, who had been prepared for the hour and day and month and year, were released, so that they would kill a third of Mankind. 

God had prepared these demons for this particular time, when they would be released to attack Mankind. And they murdered a third of all the people who were alive at that time, all over the world.

(16) The number of the armies of the horsemen was two hundred million; I heard the number of them. 

They had gathered larger armies than have ever been mustered before. The three largest armies in human history added together only numbered 12 million.

(17) And this is how I saw in the vision the horses and those who sat on them: the riders had breastplates the color of fire and of hyacinth and of brimstone; 

These are the three primary colors: red, blue and yellow. There are currently nine nations who use these colors: Andorra, Chad, Moldova, Romania, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Columbia, Venesuela, Ecuador and Mongolia. 

and the heads of the horses are like the heads of lions; and out of their mouths proceed fire and smoke and brimstone. 

If these are human armies, I would suspect that they would be war machines, like tanks, that John would have no idea how to describe. He only knew of animals that would move on their own.

(18) A third of Mankind was killed by these three plagues, by the fire and the smoke and the brimstone which proceed out of their mouths. 
(19) For the power of the horses is in their mouths and in their tails; for their tails are like serpents and have heads, and with them they do harm. 

Tanks can fire from both the front and the back, and gunpowder and ammunition were both foreign to John.

(20) The rest of Mankind, who were not killed by these plagues, did not repent of the works of their hands, so as not to worship demons, and the idols of gold and of silver and of brass and of stone and of wood, which can neither see nor hear nor walk;
(21) and they did not repent of their murders nor of their sorceries nor of their immorality nor of their thefts. 

Even though there had been so much carnage, the survivors still would not acknowledge God, but just continued even more passionately in their evil wickedness. They had no respect for life or morality or human rights, just their own lusts and demon worship. 

God has finished trying to entice humans, and is now dispensing with the carrot and using the stick. 

The next chapter describes another conversation John had with another angel, who told him, "that there will be delay no longer, but in the days of the voice of the seventh angel, when he is about to sound, then the mystery of God is finished, as He preached to His servants the prophets" (10: 6-7). 

A mystery is something that has not yet been revealed; now the mystery will be "finished" so that everything promised will then be fulfilled, when the seventh angel sounds his Trumpet. 

Then chapter 11 starts with the two witnesses, who are preaching in Jerusalem for 42 months, three and a half years. This is the time of the Great Tribulation, the second half of the 7 years. They may have been preaching during the devastation of the Trumpets that have sounded so far. When they're killed, their bodies lie open in the street for three and a half days, then they are resurrected, and called up into the clouds. It looks like they're raptured. 

Now, "the third woe is coming quickly" (11: 14). 

We will look at that tomorrow. 

O my Father, please help us understand how You have ordered Your timeline for Mankind. You have given parts of it here, and other parts to other prophets, and You are getting ready to finish Your Plan for us. Show us how to discern how everything is unfolding as we are in the midst of it. Even when we're in the middle of the chaos, help us to understand that it is just as You have revealed it.

My Father, continue to hold us in Your hand, secure and protected through all the troubles and cares of this life, growing us more mature in You, and learning to love one another unconditionally, as You have loved us. Let our love for each other show the world who You are, that You have sent Your Son to be our Savior, and that You have graciously and generously offered Your unimaginable gift to each one of us all. Let everyone alive hear and understand Your gift, and bring all Your embryonic children to the birth into Your own family. 

And every eye shall see, every knee will bow, every tongue will confess that Jesus is our Christ, the Lord God Almighty, sovereign King over all Creation; to the everlasting glory of Almighty God the Father, for ever and ever. Amen. 

Even so, come soon, Lord Jesus!