When Angels Become Evangelists

I have entitled this message, When Angels Become Evangelists. When Angels Become Evangelists, Revelation chapter 14. We'll be looking at verses 6 down through 20.

Last time, if you were not here for the message, we covered the first five verses and we looked at the 144,000 that were sealed by God to survive the Great Tribulation and be evangelists. And they're standing there in triumph having survived because, of course, the seal of God to protect them worked. So there's not 139,099, there is 144,000 there with the Lord.

And they are gathered there and getting ready for the Battle of Armageddon which we have a preview of at the end of this chapter. And so this time we're going to see the final call of repentance from God to man on earth before Armageddon, before there is no time left to be saved. I'm amazed that God calls as much as He does.

I really am. And I truly believe that in the life of every individual, He approaches you in so many ways. He is so aggressive in His saving work.

And man is so flippant with the time issues in his life as though he's got all the time in the world to make up his mind. But you don't. You really don't.

As I was studying this, I recalled several years back when a jet went down over Poland and there were 180 people who died on that jet. That jet, before it crashed, had 30 minutes in the air where they were trying to make contact with the tower and try to save the plane and the people. It crashed after the 30 minutes.

For those 30 minutes, the people pretty much knew all the efforts to make contact were not going to work and they were not going to be saved from death. And you have to wonder what was on their minds. What would be on your mind if you were sitting knowing in 30 minutes, I'm going to die.

Where would your heart be at? Where would your mind be at? If you walk with the Lord day by day, I can tell you where your heart would be at. You'd be just getting excited to see the face of Jesus. A pastor friend of mine tells a story when they were coming back from Ireland and they were out over the ocean, out there by Greenland, Iceland, all of that.

Really cold ocean. And they were in a big 747. And they were having problems with the pressure in the jet so the pilot took the 747 and he put it into a nosedive.

And then to slow it down, he began to go back and forth. And the people on the jet were of course screaming and just blowing their minds. However, there was a large group of Christians among them.

You know what they were doing as that 747 was going straight down towards that freezing ocean? They started singing, This plane is bound for glory. This plane. This plane is bound for glory.

See, I can tell you what would be in your heart if you knew that you were going to die if you walk with God every day. Because he's there putting the peace that passes all understanding into your heart. As Paul wrote to the Philippians, to guard your heart.

It mounts a garrison around your heart and it guards you and it keeps you. God is so good. It's best to settle the salvation issue today so that you don't have to presume upon God on how much time you have to make your choice.

Because God has given you choice and he honors the choices you make. He honors them eternally. Let's read over the text and then we'll get into it.

Revelation chapter 14 verse 6. Then I saw another angel flying in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach to those who dwell on the earth, to those who dwell on the earth is a phrase in the book of Revelation describing non-believers, non-believers. To those who dwell on the earth, to every nation, tribe, tongue, and people. Saying with a loud voice, Fear God, give glory to him, for the hour of his judgment has come.

And worship him who made heaven and earth, the sea and the springs of water. Another angel followed, saying, Babylon is fallen, is fallen, that great city, because she has made all the nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication. Then a third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, if anyone worships the beast and his image and receives his mark on his forehead or on his hand, he himself shall also drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out in full strength into the cup of his indignation.

He shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, in the presence of the lamb and the smoke of their torment ascends forever and ever. And they have no rest day or night. Who worship the beast and his image, whoever receives the mark of his name.

Then here, in contrast, here is the patience of the saints. Here are those who keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus. Then I heard a voice from heaven saying to me, right? Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on.

Yes, says the spirit that they may rest from their labors and their works. Follow them. Then I looked and behold, the white cloud on the cloud sat one like the son of man, having on his head a gold crown and in his hand a sharp sickle.

And another angel came out of the temple. There's six angels all together that we see here. Another angel came out of the temple, crying with a loud voice to him who sat on the cloud.

Thrust in your sickle and reap for the time for you to reap the harvest for the harvest of the earth is right. So he who sat on the cloud thrust in his sickle on the earth and the earth was reaped. Then another angel came out of the temple, which is in heaven.

He also having a sharp sickle. And another angel came out from the altar who had the power over fire. And he cried out with a loud cry to him who had the sharp sickle saying thrust in your sharp sickle.

The repetition of the sharp is to emphasize that it cannot be stopped from doing its job of judgment. It's repeated over and over. Thrust in your sharp sickle and gather the clusters of the vine of the earth, the vine of the earth.

It's that goes hand in hand with the phrase, those who dwell in the earth for her grapes are fully ripe, actually overripe, beginning to rot. So the angel thrust in his sickle into the earth and gathered the vine of the earth and threw it into the great winepress of the wrath of God. And the winepress was trampled outside the city.

And the blood came out of the winepress up to the horse's bridles for one thousand six hundred furlongs. This is a very fascinating passage. And I'm glad that we have the book of Revelation that we've studied behind us so that it doesn't strike us as being odd.

Rather, it strikes us as being very gracious on the part of God to do this. And it strikes me as being very wonderful and graphic that God would reveal so much to us and have it in the Bible. He's certainly revealing a lot to those on the earth at that time.

Now, basically, I'm going to give you four things here, the message of the angels, the blessing of the martyrs, the world that is ripe for judgment. And then we have a brief preview of the Battle of Armageddon. Four things evident to all of us, I think, is the first thing, the message of the angels.

Their words are here and they are definitely understandable and they are definitely unmistakable. The angels are crying out with a loud voice so everyone can hear them on the earth. If you recall, we've seen angels in the book of Revelation in our study already.

And some of them, one individual, one angel in particular, was as bright as the sun. So when these angels go over and let me just back up. There was another angel who was holding the scroll and he was standing on the four corners of the earth.

If you were here, you remember that he was gigantic. Then John had to eat the scroll. So the angel had to shrink down to John's size and shrink the scroll down from standing on the four corners of the earth to be able to walk over to John and hand him the scroll and have him eat it.

So that angel was gigantic on full zoom. And then he shrunk down to John's size and gave him the scroll. All of that is to say they can assume a size big enough for people to see them as they go by.

If you just imagine some little man in his flying outfit flying by, you're thinking, well, maybe everybody can't see him. Angels can be any size they want to be and any brightness God wants them to be. So they'll be very visible, very loud, very clear, understandable, unmistakable in their final call to men to repent.

Because if they reject God and follow the Antichrist, they will be eternally lost. The first thing is there is this angel. First of these three is the angel of the gospel.

I saw another angel flying in the midst of heaven, in the midst of heaven, because Satan has at this time been cast down to the earth. He no longer has access before God, as in the book of Job. He's been cast down and confined to the earth with all of his demons and all of those that came out of the bottomless pit.

They are all confined to the earth. He is flying in the midst of heaven, so just beyond the reach of Satan, so that what he is doing will be completely unhindered by Satan. War already broke out in heaven.

Michael already had his war with the devil and his demons. They are cast down. There's no more conflict as has gone on in the past with the evil angels versus the holy.

So these angels fly unobstructed by Satan and his demons in the midst of heaven and the devil's confined down to the realm of the earth itself. So the angels out of the reach of the devil flying in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach to those who dwell on the earth. Every nation, tribe, tongue and people.

So everybody will hear the gospel on the whole earth saying with a loud voice, fear God and give him glory. The hour of his judgment has come. Worship him who made heaven and the earth and the sea and the springs of water.

Why is an angel preaching the gospel? I thought men preach the gospel. Well, God has used men to preach the gospel. God is using an angel to preach the gospel here.

He is preaching the gospel here. One reason is because man has rejected the witness overall of other men and women who are Christians. So now he goes beyond what he's done before.

And he has actually an angel preaching the gospel to the whole world. Why? Because it's the last time the gospel is going out. If they don't respond to this angel, that's it.

There will be no more chances. And so he's giving the gospel to the whole world. And another reason is because he's preaching this angel's preaching because the deception of Satan is so great.

The deception is so great and God is so gracious. You see, God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. And so he has, in the midst of all the deception of the Antichrist that deceives so many people worldwide, he goes beyond his normal mode of operation to have an angel actually flying all over the world preaching the gospel so that they can actually see from heaven the gospel being preached.

It's God going literally above and beyond his normal approach to save men. The thing that strikes me as so amazing is how gracious God is that he would even do this. Because back in chapter six, verse 16, can you hold your place and go back to Revelation 6, 16? We found out there that those who dwell on the earth at that point in the tribulation understand who God is and understand who Jesus Christ is.

Revelation 16, they hid themselves in the caves and the rocks and the mountains, and they said to the mountains, The rocks fall on us and hide us from the face of him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of who? The Lamb. So they understand the gospel. They understand who God is.

They understand who Jesus Christ is. And they reject him. So for God to go beyond all of that and then go beyond just witnessing through men to witness through angels, that's the grace of God.

I love reading my Bible and finding out God is more gracious than I thought he was before as I continue to pour over the pages year after year. You know why? Because there's great application to my life to discover God is more gracious than I thought he was. And the other thing is, you know, people who follow Satan think they're on the winning side.

If you talk to a Satan worshipper today, they would tell you, Look around the world and see who's winning. Are you Christians winning? Is your God winning or is the devil winning? Satan worshippers today, they just point to the world as it is and they'll say, Look, who's winning? And they believe. It seems like the devil is winning.

So at first glance, it's a fairly good argument. The problem with it is it's false. So Satan worshippers believe they're on the winning side.

So this is another reason there are angels flying through the heavens to get to even those people to try to pierce their hearts and their deceived minds if perchance they could be saved. And another thing I like about it is it is an outward visible display of the great lengths that God goes to to save an individual. Angels are ministers sent forth to minister to those who are heirs of salvation.

We read in Hebrews chapter one. So they are an unseen array. Most of the time we don't see them, but they are very active in the work of salvation.

Here we get to see them visible in the work of salvation. It is an outward visible display of the great lengths God goes to to save an individual. Why do you need to know that? Because when you're praying for somebody, it isn't just simply your prayers alone involved in saving that person's soul.

God Almighty himself with his angelic host is involved in bringing people to Christ. Your prayers join in with that work. It sheds a different light on your prayers, doesn't it? Because we tend to think sometimes our little smoldering prayers are the only thing going up to God that gives this person over here a chance to be saved.

There is so much more behind the scenes. Your prayers join in. They don't stand alone.

So here is this angel preaching the gospel and he is calling them specifically. If you notice, he says that they should. Verse seven of Revelation 14.

Worship him who made heaven and earth, the sea and the springs of water. He's calling them to their creator away from what they're doing right now, which is worshiping the creature, the creature. See, by this time, the Antichrist has set himself up to be God, and he put an image in the Holy of Holies in the temple in Jerusalem so that he demanded that all the world worship this image as God.

Man was created in the image of who? God. Here is Satan's Christ, Satan's Christ, the Antichrist. He creates an image in his image and tells the whole world to worship that image.

He's trying to recreate man in his own image. And basically all that follow him become like him. This angel is calling mankind back away from that to the one who really created them to worship him and turn away from this heinous thing.

Jeremiah 10, 11, God spoke about this time. He said, Thus, you shall say to them, the gods that have not made the heavens and the earth shall perish from the earth, because that's where they are, shall perish from the earth and under these heavens. And this is the time when it happens.

So you've got three angels. The first one says turn away from worshiping the creature. Worship the creator.

Why is man so susceptible when the Antichrist sets up his image and calls mankind to worship it? Why? I'll tell you why. Because he's been doing something like that throughout his history. Turn in your Bible, hold your place in Revelation and turn to Romans chapter 1, verse 23.

Tells us that man is without excuse because of the testimony of God and creation. And then it says that man, Romans 1, 23, changed the glory of the incorruptible God. What does it say? Into an image made like corruptible man.

That is exactly what the Antichrist does in the holy of holies when he makes the image of himself and demands the world to worship him. And that is why they are so receptive, because they'd already been doing that throughout the history of mankind. So here's an angel with the gospel.

Then the second angel has the announcement of the fall of Babylon. And we're going to deal with this further in the book of Revelation. So I'm just going to touch on it for a moment.

Says in Revelation 14, eight, another angel followed, saying Babylon is fallen, is fallen. The great city, because she has made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication. What is fallen and what is falling? What is falling apart? What is falling down? What is falling away to be put away? Is Babylon in the sense of the Babylonian influence, which is in the book of Revelation? And we'll get into it later, as I said.

But in this sense, just to give it to you briefly, it is the Antichrist religious system and the Antichrist political system. Those are his two prongs of power. The false prophet has the religious system that affects the whole world.

And he has the political system, the Antichrist, which rules the whole world, both of which are coming crashing down now. And so this angel is saying, if you have been following this individual, know this. His whole thing is falling apart.

It's going down. It's doomed. And so are you if you follow him and take his mark.

And that's what the third angel says. Third angel, verse nine, followed them. Notice that angels do different things, just like we do.

God is very consistent in how he works. Each has a different job. The first one gives the gospel.

The second one gives a proclamation that the Antichrist system is falling apart. And the third one gives a warning. It reminds me so much of how we work in the body of Christ.

Some of us witness, have the gift of evangelism. Some of us warn, teaching every man and warning every man, the Apostle Paul said. And others make the proclamation that this world is going to fall apart.

We all do our part. One plants, one waters. God gives the increase.

And so it is with angels, not just us. There's great freedom in understanding that. The freedom to be yourself.

All that you can be for God. So in verse 14, in chapter 14, verse 9, third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, if anyone worshiped the beast and his image and receives his mark on his forehead or his hand, he himself also will drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out in full strength into the cup of his indignation. He shall be tormented with fire and brimstone.

Stop right there. These are hard words to read, aren't they? Let's all just admit it. Even as Christians, they're hard to read.

We're kind of used to them because we've read them in the Bible, tormented with fire and brimstone. If your theology is sound, that doesn't bother you. But if you stop and look at it, he will be tormented with fire and brimstone, which is one of the most irritating substances to the human flesh that there is on this earth.

With fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, in the presence of the lamb, the wrath of God poured out. These are hard words to read. They really are wrath, fire, brimstone.

Is this a hellfire and brimstone church? Folks, I'm just reading the Bible. I'm not a hellfire and brimstone guy. I'm just reading the Bible.

So if you leave here today and you say, well, what are those hellfire and brimstone messages? I'm just reading the Bible. So what happens when you go verse by verse? You run into things that maybe you'd rather not talk about. And I think truthfully, eternal hell is the most abhorrent thought the human mind can seek to grapple with.

I really do. But you know something? It's real. These words are hard, but these words are true.

And they are designed by the angel who's using them. This isn't just some person on the street witnessing. This is an angel.

They are designed to drive these people to make a choice. So if you take the mark of the beast, the Antichrist, there's no way back for you. So you have to weigh your decision well.

If you take the mark of the Antichrist, and without it, you can't buy or sell. So the pressure is tremendous. And if you don't take it, the Antichrist will hunt you down and kill you.

So the pressure to take it is tremendous. And the system to find you is already in place on the freeways, on the satellites, everywhere, across the Internet. It's already in place.

When you go to the market and they scan your canned goods, boop, boop, boop, boop. Darling, can you just pull that bag of ice on over here and let me just scan that thing? Thank you. And they just do it from like five feet away now.

Used to be they had to run it across the thing. Now they just boop. Every time they do it from about five feet away, I just think, might as well be a satellite in outer space.

This is what's in place to hunt you down. So the pressure is tremendous. But if you take the mark of the Antichrist, you're done.

Once that mark is fixed on your body, there's no way you can be saved. There's no way back. And you are headed straight for a place that has fire and brimstone and the presence of the holy angels and the smoke of their torment.

Verse 11 ascends forever and ever. The Greek here is the strongest possible Greek word for eternity. And all the people who take the mark of the Antichrist who end up in hell will have no rest day or night.

Those who worship the beast in his image, whoever receives a mark of his name. So forever and ever and ever and ever and ever there will be no rest, no rest. So the angel is putting out the warning.

Turn from this man and follow the true creator. Know his system is falling apart. Know that if you follow him, you're going down with him and you're going into hell forever with him and there will be no way back.

Make your choice now. Why is God using angels? Because he is about to throw the switch on his wrath and it's over after this, even though we have more chapters in Revelation. So we're not totally going chronologically here.

We're getting a preview, basically, of what's coming next. These angels are a preview of the bowls of judgment that will be poured out in the next chapters that follow this. You can even see them probably in little subheadings in your Bible in the next chapters.

So God has given man a choice. He's given you a choice. That is an amazing thing.

Man has the freedom of choice. Do you know that God honors your choice? That's almost a scary thing. That's what's gotten a lot of us into a lot of trouble along the way.

God has given you the freedom of choice. You make a choice and you stand by the choice and God will honor that. He will let you stand by your choice.

And that is why all of this is going on, because it's time to make up your mind time on planet Earth. And when they make their choice, God is going to honor their choice and it's going to fix their position for eternity. God will honor that choice.

Weigh well the choices you make concerning Jesus Christ and weigh it well today where you're at with him. Because the truth is you may be sitting here thinking, you know what? Yeah, I got the next 50, 20, 30, 40, 80 years of my life to live. You may have 30 minutes.

You may have 30 minutes. Is your plane bound for glory? This is the day of salvation, the Bible says. Weigh well where you are with the Lord today.

You have today. You don't know if you have tomorrow and you have the choice to make and you can make it for him. Do it.

So here are these angels announcing the message unmistakable. It is crystal clear and God will honor the choice of the people make in response. Then you have the blessed martyrs.

Verse 12 seems almost out of place, but this is a word to those that respond to this message. Here is the patience of the saints for all those that want to respond to the Lord, for all those that already have. Here is the patience of the saints or the perseverance of the saints here in the midst of all those.

You will discover those who keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus Christ. Can you imagine if at this point in time you're on the earth and you've given your life to the Lord and one day you wake up to the sound of an angel flying over and you go outside and look. And here comes another one after another one after that.

And, you know, they don't just make one pass. You know, they are scouring the world to find people. Can you imagine how encouraged you would be as a Christian? Here you have all this pressure, all this deception coming from the Antichrist and all the people following him.

I believe one of the great reasons for these angels is to encourage the Christians so that you can even read. Here is the patience of the saints. They look up.

They are encouraged. They go on being patient, persevering through the midst of the persecution, keeping the commandments of God and their faith in Jesus. And so they are given the promise of being blessed.

Why? Because of the way they live. They live keeping the commandments of God, the word of the Lord. In other words, they live keeping the faith of Jesus Christ.

They're clear on their faith. They don't equivocate on their faith, even under the threat of death and even under the pain and the torture of a real martyr's death. They hold on to their faith.

You know what is so great about that is to see that it even happens. What is so great is that saving faith is not fragile. Saved by faith through grace.

That not only for yourselves, it is a gift of God, lest any man should boast. So that when God grants saving faith, it's not fragile. When he grants saving faith, when these people here make their choice to follow the Lord in response even to the angels or even before, they make it through the greatest holocaust of persecution any Christians, any believers will ever have to face in the history of the world.

Why? Because when God grants saving faith, it is not fragile. Here is the patience, here is the perseverance of the saints. They keep the commands in the midst of all of this, of the Lord.

They walk with him through this darkness. And they keep their faith pure in him because God keeps them. The reason you're still a Christian today is because God has kept you.

All those times you spaced out, wandered out, cut out and dropped out. God brought you back. Saving faith isn't fragile.

Here is the patience of the saints. Here are those who keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus. Then I heard a voice from heaven saying to me, write, blessed are the dead.

Now, that has to be an odd beatitude, don't you think? Blessed are the poor in spirit, I understand. Blessed are they that mourn. Blessed are they that hunger and thirst.

Blessed are the dead. It's got to be one of the oddest beatitudes in the Bible at first glance. Upon pondering it, it's one of the greatest promises.

It is the greatest promise you could give these people. Because they know that if they give their life to Christ, they will die. So a voice comes out of heaven saying, blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on.

From this point of the angels preaching the gospel, anybody who comes now will pay the price of martyrdom. You need to know as you come to God that you are blessed as you die in the Lord. Then the Holy Spirit joins in.

Yes, says the Spirit. Why? Why are they blessed? Because they will rest from their labors. How great is the labor in your life, just walking with the Lord, being the light of the world, standing fast when others backslide, not compromising when others do? It's a labor, isn't it? It's not easy.

And how great heaven is going to be for you and I when we can rest from all of that fighting the devil and fighting deception and fighting sin. The rest is going to be sweet. It's going to go on forever.

Just think of how great it's going to be for these people. So the promise, blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on. So it's almost like a trailer coming after.

One more word. If you do come to Christ and you do die for your faith, the promise is there's rest waiting for you and their works will follow them. What is that? There's rewards waiting for you.

That kind of effort, that kind of service for the Lord, rest from their labors and their works follow them. Literally, how do your works follow you? All you have done for the Lord follows you into heaven and then he rewards you. For God is not unrighteous.

And maybe you need to hear this today. God is not unrighteous to forget your labor of love. This, of course, in context, talking about tribulation saints, but it applies to us.

You rest from your labors when you go to be with the Lord and your works follow you and you are rewarded for everything you ever did for the Lord. I like that. Because a lot of the things I do for the Lord I wouldn't do for anybody else for any other price.

How about you? God's love for you frees you and it purifies your motives so you're in it for him. I thank God there is the promise, blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on. Death for the Christian is an honorable discharge from the battles of life.

Andrew Bernard wrote these words before he died. He said, Lord, give me Simeon's dismissal, Christ in my arms. C.T. Studge, so practical, but so potent.

Before he died, he said this. Be sure to celebrate my funeral scripturally. Send hallelujahs all around.

It is a better day than one's wedding day. Arthur S. Wood said my happiest moment will be when God puts his hand on my heart and it stops beating. Oh.

And Thomas Brooks said a believer's last day is his best day. So the blessed martyrs. Then we have this world that's ripe for judgment.

We'll hit this quick. First time Jesus Christ came as the sower savior. The second time he is coming as the reaper of those who are ripe for judgment.

And that is the picture that you have here. There are those that try to interpret this passage as half of it saving believers and half of it judging nonbelievers. This is all judgment on those that dwell on the earth that reject all the advances of God through men.

One hundred forty four thousand. Two witnesses, the angels, all of that rejected. Now the world is ripe for judgment.

In fact, it is overly ripe and rotting. And so it's ready to be taken and thrown out. So I look and behold the white cloud and on the cloud sat one like the son of man having on his head a golden crown and in his hand a sharp sickle.

Another angel came out of the temple crying with a loud voice to him who sat on the cloud thrust in your circle and reap for the time has come for you to reap. The harvest of the earth is ripe. So he who sat on the cloud thrust in his sickle on the earth.

It's Jesus Christ and the earth was reaped and he is accompanied by other angels. Another angel came out of the temple, which is in heaven, having a sharp sickle and another angel came to accompany him. And he was saying thrust in your sharp sickle, gathered the clusters of the vine of the earth for the grapes are fully ripe.

And so the world is ready for judgment. And all this is brought together as the Antichrist. He has enemies and they are moving into place during this time to fight with him.

He is marshalling his troops to fight with them. They will come together on the plain of Megiddo, which, if you've ever been there, has got to be one of the most world class battlefields you'll ever see in your whole life. It's perfectly flat and huge.

And it is a place that has been the site of huge battles throughout history. This won't be the first time there's a huge battle there, but it will be the last battle. God will gather together these armies.

He will allow them to be drawn together by their fight with each other. And right as they begin to fight, Jesus Christ is going to come back in the middle of it and he's going to judge them. And when he does, it's spoken of in terms of a wine press.

When I was traveling in Israel on a couple of my trips, we stopped and the guy pointed out a wine press. And he said, the way this works is they put a bunch of grapes in here and then you get in and you stomp around on the grapes with your feet. And then the juice runs out the side.

These are ancient, of course. And they would draw it off and that's how they would make the wine. It is a picture familiar to the people in the time of John.

And they would understand that. But the picture is pointing to God crushing man and his judgment. Literally, by his word, Christ will crush these armies.

Literally, they will be crushed and the blood will flow. And so in the Battle of Armageddon, when Christ comes and judges mankind, the blood is going to flow. We read here in verse 20, the wine press was trampled.

So you have the sickle comes in, cuts out the vine and the grapes. Then you have the trampling of the wine press. So God cuts and then he tramples, he presses, he smashes.

And so the wine press was trampled outside the city and the blood came out of the wine press. The blood up to how high? Horses' bridles. Well, for how long of a space? 1,600 furlongs.

If you add up 1,600 furlongs, it's right at about 185 miles. Imagine blood flowing to the height of a horse's bridle. 185 miles.

Now, there is a possibility there will be around 200 million people at least in battle at Armageddon. Years ago, China in the 70s had a standing army of 200 million. Kings will come from the east to this battle.

There will be probably at least 200 million. Imagine 200 million, probably more, gathered together on this flat plain of Megiddo. We think a linear 185 miles.

But maybe it's not a linear, maybe it's not a straight line, or maybe it is. It's interesting to note, however, that the valley of Megiddo is 185 miles square. 185 square miles.

The blood may flow to the height of the horse's bridle across the entire valley. Pretty heavy, huh? Now, if there's at least 200 million, let's just say there's 200 million. If you have, say, 200 million, and they get squished in the winepress of the wrath of God, and they will be squished, then that's going to cause how many million gallons of blood to flow? That is a staggering thought.

No wonder Jesus said, unless these days were shortened, no flesh would be saved. He meant it. Thank God.

He's shortened it as much as it can be shortened, and yet at the same time to save as many as he can possibly save. I'll give you one more quick thought. If you did have an army of 200 million, and they were standing five feet apart in an area of 25 square feet, a guy five feet in front of you, five feet behind, five feet on the right, five feet on the left, and you in the middle, moving along, the 200 million would come out to be an army about 185 miles long and a mile and a half wide.

So it could be that long. There's an old saying in the Bible to describe the length of Israel from Dan to Beersheba. It's about 185 miles.

Country covered in blood is what you have at the end of the world. No wonder Israel is always in the news, because we are heading toward the end of the world. Let's pray, shall we? And we'll go on with much more in our study in Revelation next time.

Father, thank you that you are such a gracious God. Thank you that you are a saving God. And Lord, we love you so much.

And we thank you for the things that are here. Yes, some of these words are very hard to read. They're very hard to read.

But they force us to make the choice to turn into the arms of a rescuing God who will save us from the very things that are hard to read and take us into the rest and the rewards that will never end. We thank you and we praise you. In Jesus' name we pray.

Amen.