Chapter 10

THIS chapter may be read, in company with the twelfth, as forming a distinct section in the Apocalyptic book. Though the range extends from the birth of the Messiah to His return to tread the winepress of the wrath of God, yet it is principally occupied with the great events of the last half of Daniel’s seventieth week. In the twelfth and thirteenth chapters we have for the most part a record of events in relation to the earth, ―Satan, the beast, and the false prophet being the principal actors in the scene; but in the fourteenth chapter we have God brought in upon the scene, and here it is not as to how things stand in relation to Satan and the beast, but as to how they stand in relation to God. Moreover, we have here several distinct actions, but each giving us God’s mind in relation to things then connected with the earth. 1. We have God and the Lamb in relation to the remnant of Israel. 2. God’s testimony of the everlasting gospel to an apostate world. 3. God’s witness to the fall of Babylon. 4. God’s warning against worshipping the beast. 5. A voice from heaven pronouncing blessing on those who henceforth die in the Lord. 6. The harvest of the earth. 7. The vintage, or treading the winepress of the wrath of God. Let us now look a little more particularly at each of these actions.