Societal Collapse...Revelation 4-7 pt 19

09-06-16 | Bill Randles

[pastorbillrandles]

And the kings of the earth, and the great men, and the rich men, and the chief captains, and the mighty men, and every bondman, and every free man, hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains;And said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb:For the great day of his wrath is come; and who shall be able to stand? (Revelation 6: 15-17)

When Jesus opens the seals of the book given him by the Father, tremendous forces are unleashed upon the earth. All these things actually forward the plan of God to bring about a new heaven and a new earth. The convulsions are painful and awful, but as in a birth, they work together to bring forth something beautiful.

The sixth seal is given the greatest detail so far. The earth underneath is wracked with spasms, everything that can be shaken is shaken! The sky above, usually so warming, and reassuring, churns with ominous portents; stars drop, Sunlight is dimmed, and the moon warns of blood wrath.

Sadly, the sky itself, that usually testifies to the lowliest and most troubled earth dweller, that there is indeed a God of glory and another, far better place, is rolled up as a scroll, and put away. No need for that anymore, the time of witness ends, and final judgment commences.

Thus everything above us and everything below us will violently testify to the wrath of the Holy God on that day. The collapse of everything once thought sure and fixed will have an interesting effect, among us in terms of society . At the last day all people are leveled. The great, the powerful, the celebrated, the bold and daring, the irreverent, the productive, the obscure, the some bodies and the nobodies all finally arrive at the place of common ground that Utopians and collectivists always hoped for.

The leveling and unifying factor among the great and the small of men, will be the stark realization that contrary to their wishful thinking and proud boasting, there really is a God to whom we have to answer. Furthermore they will see suddenly that “Man isn’t really the measure of all things”, and that “Truth is absolute”, not relative, as their philosophers have assured them. Atheism is revealed as an impossible contradiction.

The “great men of the earth” knew it all along, but successfully suppressed the truth about God, not allowing themselves to think about Him, snuffing out the pangs of conscience, refusing even so much as any public acknowledgment of the Christian God. They were going to build a “brave New World” without God. It was going to be more compassionate than the outdated, barbaric religious world they had “evolved out of”. They long before had thrown off the shackles of the old superstition.

By the time of the sixth seal, they now know the truth, and can no longer deny it. The message of the judgments endured by those who dwell on the earth came through. The God of the Bible is a real person and the Kings of the earth have been resisting and defying Him. But rather than turning in repentance and worship as the second Psalm pleads with them to do,the great men of the earth lead an open revolt.

And the rest of the men which were not killed by these plagues yet repented not of the works of their hands, that they should not worship devils, and idols of gold, and silver, and brass, and stone, and of wood: which neither can see, nor hear, nor walk:Neither repented they of their murders, nor of their sorceries, nor of their fornication, nor of their thefts.(Revelation 9:20-21)

And the fifth angel poured out his vial upon the seat of the beast; and his kingdom was full of darkness; and they gnawed their tongues for pain,And blasphemed the God of heaven because of their pains and their sores, and repented not of their deeds.(Revelation 16:10-11)

They get to the point where they wish they could just melt away, to dissolve, or to be covered by rocks and stones ! They want to hide from that which they fear the most, for there is an aspect about the last encounter with the God they have rebelled against that is positively unbearable to these men.

What I refer to is the fact that it is the wrath of the Lamb, being expressed, not the wrath of an angry, vengeful God of hateful fury. This the wrath of one who actually loved them, appealed to them, bore scars in his hands and feet to save them, bled and died for them, and paid the price for their reconciliation!

This is the unbearable part that makes these proud men rather wish they would be crushed in an avalanche than have to face. The Holy wrath of spurned love, self-sacrifice, vicarious shame and suffering, is what these sinners fear and loathe perhaps the most of all. To look upon the face of the One who willingly died for them, will be worse to them than hell itself.

And the loftiness of man shall be bowed down, and the haughtiness of men shall be made low: and the LORD alone shall be exalted in that day.And the idols he shall utterly abolish. And they shall go into the holes of the rocks, and into the caves of the earth, for fear of the LORD, and for the glory of his majesty, when he ariseth to shake terribly the earth.In that day a man shall cast his idols of silver, and his idols of gold, which they made each one for himself to worship, to the moles and to the bats;To go into the clefts of the rocks, and into the tops of the ragged rocks, for fear of the LORD, and for the glory of his majesty, when he ariseth to shake terribly the earth.Cease ye from man, whose breath is in his nostrils: for wherein is he to be accounted of ?(Isaiah 2:17-22)

[beethovenfan]

Is there a book containing all parts of this series which can be obtained? Thank you.

[pastorbillrandles]

Every one of the articles is categorized as Revelation 4-7 on my blog- billrandles.Wordpress.com