SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 10/4/2015 10:11 PM
My Worship Time Focus: The Victory of the Conqueror PT-1
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Revelation 19:17-21
Message of the verses: "17 Then I saw an angel standing in the sun, and he cried out with a loud voice, saying to all the birds which fly in midheaven, "Come, assemble for the great supper of God, 18 so that you may eat the flesh of kings and the flesh of commanders and the flesh of mighty men and the flesh of horses and of those who sit on them and the flesh of all men, both free men and slaves, and small and great." 19 And I saw the beast and the kings of the earth and their armies assembled to make war against Him who sat on the horse and against His army. 20 And the beast was seized, and with him the false prophet who performed the signs in his presence, by which he deceived those who had received the mark of the beast and those who worshiped his image; these two were thrown alive into the lake of fire which burns with brimstone. 21 And the rest were killed with the sword which came from the mouth of Him who sat on the horse, and all the birds were filled with their flesh."
As we begin this SD we begin looking at the last five verses in the 19th chapter of the book of Revelation and this will be a great turning point in the book of Revelation as when we finish studying the results of this chapter we will learn that planet earth will never be the same again, and then once the thousand years of Christ’s rule on earth is finished we will learn that planet earth will be no more, so yes this will be a great turning point in the book of Revelation, but we still have a few days to look at these verses before we get to what comes next.
It runs in my mind that the word angel and angels is seen a total of seventy times in the book of Revelation fifty for the word angel and twenty-two for the word angels, and we begin verse seventeen with another angel in it, as they play a key role in one of the end-time scenarios described in this book. As we look at verse seventeen we see that this angel is standing in the sun and John MacArthur explains "that is, in the proximity of the sun, possibly in front of it, partially eclipsing it. He stands in a conspicuous, prominent place to make this important announcement." Remember what happened during the fifth bowl judgment? The earth turned dark, so that must be over by now and the sun is back to shining on the earth again. Let us look at Revelation 16:10 "Then the fifth angel poured out his bowl on the throne of the beast, and his kingdom became darkened; and they gnawed their tongues because of pain." I remember looking at some of the judgments that took place against Egypt during the Exodus and this one seems to me that it could be similar in the way that some of the later judgments that came upon Egypt did not come upon the children of Israel who lived in Goshen, so perhaps this fifth judgment did not affect all the earth, or at least where the believers were.
Once again we see the word "loud" as the angel cried out with a loud voice. I suppose that his voice would have to be loud if he was near the sun, after all that is 93 million miles away. Indecently we see the word "loud" twenty-one times in the book of Revelation. This angel is addressing all the birds which fly in midheaven as he invites them to have supper as there will be a lot of carnage from this last battle. MacArthur writes "The angel thus declares Christ’s victory before the battle is ever fought. His invitation to the birds is reminiscent of Jesus’ words in Matthew 2 4:27-28: ‘27 "For just as the lightning comes from the east and flashes even to the west, so will the coming of the Son of Man be. 28 "Wherever the corpse is, there the vultures will gather.’" We can also compare this verse with Luke 17:37 "And answering they said to Him, "Where, Lord?" And He said to them, "Where the body is, there also the vultures will be gathered.’"
We can look at some of the different Scriptures in the OT to find out that this is not the first time that birds have feasted on the dead bodies of humans. "They will be left together for mountain birds of prey, And for the beasts of the earth; And the birds of prey will spend the summer feeding on them, And all the beasts of the earth will spend harvest time on them." This verse speaks of the results of judgment on Cush which is modern day Ethiopia. Next Jeremiah 7:33 ""The dead bodies of this people will be food for the birds of the sky and for the beasts of the earth; and no one will frighten them away." Now we will next look at a longer passage from the book of Ezekiel as we look at chapter 39:17-20 "17 "As for you, son of man, thus says the Lord GOD, ’Speak to every kind of bird and to every beast of the field, "Assemble and come, gather from every side to My sacrifice which I am going to sacrifice for you, as a great sacrifice on the mountains of Israel, that you may eat flesh and drink blood. 18 "You will eat the flesh of mighty men and drink the blood of the princes of the earth, as though they were rams, lambs, goats and bulls, all of them fatlings of Bashan. 19 "So you will eat fat until you are glutted, and drink blood until you are drunk, from My sacrifice which I have sacrificed for you. 20 "You will be glutted at My table with horses and charioteers, with mighty men and all the men of war," declares the Lord GOD." These verses could very well be speaking of the same thing that we are reading about in this section of Revelation. There is great debate as to when this section of Ezekiel will take place, which Ezekiel calls the battle of Gog and Magog. Some believe that it could happen before the Tribulation begins and others believe it will happen sometime during the Tribulation, even just before the coming of Christ.
We finish this SD with a quote from John MacArthur and then I want to also quote what I wrote in 2005 on some of these verses: "It is an important fact to consider that every year millions of birds of many species migrate south from Europe to Africa. They fly over the land of Israel on their journey. The number of these birds and their migrating patterns has been the special study of the Israeli government because of the threat they pose to aircraft. This can certainly answer the question as to where such vast numbers of birds will come from. The geographical setting of Israel, situated between the Mediterranean Sea on the west and the vast expanse of barren desert to the east, forms the natural corridor for these migrating birds."
"The scene changes a bit as John records the words of an angel who is standing in the sun shouting to the birds who are flying in the midheaven, (close to the earth), saying to them that they should get ready to eat the flesh of men and horses who will soon be killed as they fight against He who sits upon a white horse and has a sword in His mouth. This is the end of the battle of Armageddon and what seems strange about it is that these men came out to fight against one another, but when they see the Lord Jesus Christ coming back to earth with His army they begin to fight against Him instead of fighting against each other. Jesus fights against this army by using the sword that He has in His mouth, and this sword could represent His Word. This will be the end of war, for afterwards the Lord will set up His Kingdom on earth as He will sit upon His throne in Jerusalem. Dr. Wiersbe points out that the word flesh is used six times in this section of this letter. The word "flesh" is used in different ways in God’s Word, and one of the meanings is that of the outside covering of a person or an animal, and this is how the word is used here, however there is another way that the word "flesh" is used in the Bible, and that represents the old nature of man that he was born with, the nature that he received from Adam and the Bible never has anything good to say about that nature. All of these people who will be killed by the sword that is in the mouth of the Lord Jesus Christ only have this old nature as opposed to those who have been born of God who receive a new nature, and the Bible never has anything bad to say about this new nature given to believers by the Lord." (From my SD of 11/10/ 2005)
Spiritual meaning for my life today: I remember that it is the Lord who puts in the minds of these who will be in this last battle to come to Israel, and He uses demons to accomplish all of this as He wants them to come there so that they can be judged by Him. The fact is that this is truly what they want to do.
My Steps of Faith for Today: A word of great praise for me is what I want to do in this section today as I am so very thankful that my daughter and her family were with us in church this evening setting beside us and we had the great privilege of taking part in the Lord’s Supper, and one of my grandsons was there with us too. God is so great!
Answer to yesterday’s Bible question: "Seven" (Luke 8:2).
Today’s Bible question: "Who said ‘"Lord, we do not know where You are going, how do we know the way?’"
Answer in our next SD.
10/4/2015 10:56 PM
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