BOOK OF REVELATION
Lesson 33 - Chapters 15 & 16
We got most of the way through Revelation chapter 15 last week, and we'll finish it up today
and get started on chapter 16.
Because chapter 15 is so short, we'll re-read it in its entirety to begin our study for today.
RE-READ REVELATION CHAPTER 15 all
Remembering that what we're reading in Revelation is a series of visions that God gave to
John while he was in forced exile on the Island of Patmos, then we also need to follow that his
visions alternate between what is happening in Heaven and what is happening on Earth.
Getting it straight on where the actions are happening is critical to understanding this book.
The things that happen in Heaven are in some ways more difficult to think about because since
as living physical beings we exist in a world controlled by time and space, everything for us
operates in a sequence (first this, then that, then what comes next, and so on). But in Heaven
the concept of sequence is more challenging to mentally picture because there is no such thing
as time in that mysterious spiritual dimension that all Believers count on eventually winding up
in. In other words our standard conceptions of past, present, and future don't exist there. There
is no dynamic of what comes first, and then second, and then third, and so on. It is as though
everything that has happened or will ever happen in Heaven happen all at once. I have no
illusions that this is a great definition of how things occur in Heaven; but it's about the best I
can do when using my finite mind to try to understand and explain the in-finite.
Further we must always be careful about how to understand the objects and the beings that
the Scripture verses speak about that are in Heaven. By definition the spiritual world does not
and can not contain physical things. Heaven is 100% spiritual in nature..... invisible to the
human eye.... while Earth and all of its creatures and objects are always physical in nature. So
when we read of thrones, and harps, and smoke, and a Temple and more in Heaven, God has
given John visions of physical forms that merely represent the invisible spiritual forms that
actually exist in Heaven; physical forms that he stands a better chance of comprehending and
then communicating to others.
The vision recorded in chapter 15 takes place in Heaven so everything we read about objects
and people are to be taken as representative. And what we see is 7 angels that have each
been given a bowl that contains a judgment that will, in turn, be poured out upon earth and its
inhabitants. Thus Christianity has labeled these the 7 Bowl Judgments. So now we've had the
7 Seal Judgments (each of the 7 representing one of the 7 seals that sealed a scroll that God
handed to the Lamb), then the 7 Trumpet Judgments (each judgment announced by a trumpet
or shofar blown by an angel), and now the 7 Bowl Judgments. Added together we get a total of
21. There is some scholarly debate about whether the 7 Bowl Judgments are judgments 15
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through 21, but I don't see evidence to think it is not especially when verse 1 says that these
are the final judgments.
Especially from verse 2 forward we need to picture that everything that is happening is
happening in connection with God's Heavenly Temple. Thus the representative figures of
people and objects that are spoken of can be better understood by visualizing their physical
counterparts in God's earthly Temple in Jerusalem. Going back to the teaching of the Torah, I
introduced to you the principle of the Reality of Duality. It is that what happens in Heaven in the
spiritual world has a counterpart that happens on earth in the physical world. However, the
objects and beings spoken of in Heaven are perfect and complete as compared to their inferior
and incomplete counterparts on earth. So what happens on earth can be said to be but a
shadow of what happens in Heaven.
Since beginning in verse 2 we are reading about goings on in Heaven, and specifically in
relation to the Heavenly Temple or Tabernacle, then we can understand the sea of glass mixed
with fire in Heaven as something that must also exist in some form on earth. And indeed,
although in John's day the Jerusalem Temple lay in ruins at the hands of the Romans,
nonetheless the object that the sea of glass represents is the giant water laver that was
present in the Temple grounds of the earthly Temple when it stood intact. And in fact that giant
water laver went by the name of "the sea" due to the enormous amount of water that it held. So
while the earthly laver held water, the Heavenly laver held what more resembled glass and fire.
In both cases the contents of the laver was used to purify.
The mention of people in Heaven holding harps has as its earthly counterpart the Levite
musicians who played harps at ritual ceremonies at the Jerusalem Temple. So very likely those
departed souls in Heaven playing harps were the souls of Levites who died trusting Yeshua as
their Messiah.
Continuing that same theme, there were people in Heaven (again, spiritual souls in actuality)
singing the song of Moses and the song of the Lamb. We discussed this last time and I only
wish to reiterate that the song of Moses and the song of the Lamb are but one song and it is
sung to the Father (called God of Heaven's Armies and King of the Nations in the song). This is
not a song being sung to Moses or to the Lamb (Christ). If anything, we have Moses and
Yeshua joining in with the others who are signing these words in praise of the Father. When
the Temple stood, Levite singers would sing the Song of Moses as taken from Deuteronomy
32 as part of regular Temple liturgy. But now, since both Moses and Yeshua (the Lamb) were
mediators for Israel, then the song is described as the Song of Moses and the Lamb. However
to be clear, this is NOT the same as the Song of Moses as taken from Deuteronomy; rather, it
is a new song.... a victory song.... that we read in verses 3 and 4. That both mediators are
mentioned (and if one wishes to get technical about preeminence of persons depending on
who is mentioned first, then Moses gets top billing in this song) it indicates their mutual
continuing relevance and importance to the redemption plan and process.
Verse 5 can get a little confusing the way we find it translated in most Bibles although the CJB
has done a better job of it. Let's take a quick look at a couple of other Bible versions to see
how they deal with verse 5.
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KJV
Revelation 15:5 And after that I looked, and, behold, the temple of the tabernacle of
the testimony in heaven was opened:
NAS
Revelation 15:5 After these things I looked, and the temple of the tabernacle of
testimony in heaven was opened,
In reality the KJV and NAS translations are more true to the Greek. The CJB is what is called a
dynamic translation that attempts to explain what is meant versus merely translating the words.
And in our case, the difficult part is trying to understand what the "temple of the tabernacle of
the testimony" means. Looking at the Greek helps us right away. The Greek word being
translated to "temple" is naos. It is speaking NOT of the Temple in general, but rather ONLY of
the inner sanctum; that is, the two inner chambers inside the Temple called the Holy Place and
the Holy of Holies. Taken together, these two inner chambers are usually called the Sanctuary
in the Bible (which is how the CJB deals with it).
So this verse is really saying that the sanctuary portion of the Temple complex in Heaven was
opened and (in verse 6) out of the sanctuary portion came those 7 angels with their 7 bowls.
To clarify: the earthly counterpart of what is described as occurring in Heaven is speaking of
the Holy Place and the Holy of Holies in the Jerusalem Temple. These 7 angels were dressed
in clean white linen garments with golden belts around their chests. Obviously spiritual beings
like angels don't wear physical garments of white linen. However since the Heavenly Temple is
representative of its earthly counterpart, Levitical priests are required to wear clean, white linen
garments with a belt around their waist, especially when serving inside the sanctuary. In fact,
on the one day per year that the High Priest is allowed inside the Holy of Holies (on earth) he
doesn't wear his usual colorful garment but must instead wear a simple white garment. The
white color indicates purity and oftentimes humility.
In verse 7 one of the 4 Living Beings who surrounds God's throne and goes with Him wherever
He goes as the protectors of His incomparable holiness, gives these bowls full of God's
ferocious judgment to the 7 angels. Again we see the connection between the Heavenly and
earthly temples as bowls were a normal and customary part of ritual performed by priests in
Temple service. I think since these 7 angels emerged from the sanctuary it would be correct to
refer to them as angelic priests. We know from other passages that angels have a hierarchy of
some sort, and perhaps those who serve God in the Heavenly Temple are a special class,
which I shall call priests.
Finally in verse 8, we're told that the Heavenly sanctuary was filled with the smoke of God's
glory. I think that the CJB has it better described as the smoke of God's Sh'khinah. We have
seen a similar phenomenon occur within the earthly Temple. Listen to this passage from
2Chronicles of something that happened back in the days of King Solomon, and it is so very
similar to what John is being shown in his vision.
CJB
2 Chr 5:6-6:1
6
King Shlomo and the whole community of Isra'el who had assembled
in his presence were in front of the ark, sacrificing sheep and oxen in numbers beyond
counting or recording.
7
The cohanim brought the ark for the covenant of ADONAI in to
its place inside the sanctuary of the house, to the Especially Holy Place, under the
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wings of the k'ruvim.
8
For the k'ruvim spread out their wings over the place for the ark,
covering the ark and its poles from above.
9
The poles were so long that their ends could be seen [extending] from the ark into the
sanctuary, but they could not be seen from outside; they are there to this day.
10
There
was nothing in the ark except the two tablets Moshe put there at Horev, when ADONAI
made the covenant with the people of Isra'el at the time of their leaving Egypt.
11
When the cohanim came out of the Holy Place (for all the cohanim who were present
had consecrated themselves; they didn't keep to their divisions;
12
also the L'vi'im who
were the singers, all of them- Asaf, Heman, Y'dutun and their sons and relatives-
dressed in fine linen, with cymbals, lutes and lyres, stood on the east side of the altar;
and with them 120 cohanim sounding trumpets),
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then, when the trumpeters and
singers were playing in concord, to be heard harmoniously praising and thanking
ADONAI, and they lifted their voices together with the trumpets, cymbals and other
musical instruments to praise ADONAI: "for he is good, for his grace continues
forever"- then, the house, the house of ADONAI, was filled with a cloud;
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so that
because of the cloud, the cohanim could not stand up to perform their service; for the
glory of ADONAI filled the house of God.
Notice that we have the Levite musicians, the singing, the priests, the heavy involvement of the
Holy Place and the Holy of Holies (the sanctuary), and God's presence in the form of a cloud
that filled the sanctuary such that the priests couldn't perform their normal Temple service.
Although in the description of the Heavenly Temple it was smoke that represented God's glory
and filled the Heavenly sanctuary, just remember that smoke is being used as a figurative
term. Smoke and a cloud perform the same function; they obscure and/or hide something from
the sight of humans.
And just as the priests in Solomon's day couldn't perform their service for God until the cloud of
God's presence left the sanctuary, we read in Revelation 15:8 that no one (that is, no departed
soul or any angel in Heaven) could enter the Heavenly sanctuary until the 7 angelic priests with
their bowls filled with God's wrath had completed their assigned tasks. A major point to notice
is that when God decides to act, not even the Heavenly angels can do anything but observe
and obey.
Let's move on to Revelation 16. Here is another case in which a manmade chapter break
obscures the natural flow of the narrative. There should have been no chapter break at all at
this point. To help us, then, to recover the natural flow I'm going to start reading from chapter
15 verse 8 and continue to the end of chapter 16.
READ REVELATION CHAPTER 15:8 - 16 all
So chapter 16 continues with what is going on in the Heavenly Temple, but now it will also
begin to incorporate what is going to happen on Earth.
The Heavenly sanctuary is emptied of everyone except God's presence (His glory), with the 7
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angelic priests having being sent out of the sanctuary with their bowls of judgment in hand, in
preparation to carry out their task of administering God's justice. So verse 1 of chapter 16 says
that a loud voice came from inside the emptied sanctuary and ordered the 7 angels to
immediately begin pouring out their bowls on the earth. Who was in the sanctuary? Only God.
So it had to be His voice, although there is room to allow that it could have been one of the 4
Living Beings that goes wherever God goes. But saying that is only acknowledging a
speculative possibility as there is nothing in these verses to hint that this was the case.
In 1st century Jewish thought every form of created life had a guardian angel, and different
groups of angels were responsible for different activities and even had specified areas where
they were assigned to operate. So I want to throw out something rather fascinating for you take
as you see fit. In a pseudepigraphical work from around the 2nd century called the Testament
of Solomon (yes, the same Solomon that is King David's son), the author of this book names 7
angels of punishment or wrath that he says exists. The first is Kushiel, which means the rigid
one of God. The second is Lahatiel, the flaming one of God. The third is Shaftiel, the judge of
God. The fourth is Makatiel that translates to plague of God. The fifth angel is Hutriel, rod of
God. The sixth is Pusiel meaning fire of God. And the seventh and final angel of punishment is
Rogziel, the wrath of God. I cannot account for the veracity of this as far as to whether it is
truth or not. The consensus is that it was written by a Believer in Christ, either Jew or gentile.
The Testament of Solomon is not a book that is part of the Jewish or Christian
canon. However, that does not automatically make it a lie or a fairy tale. You be the judge.
I want to shift focus for a few minutes to make a pertinent point that will likely cause discomfort
among some of you, maybe even a little anger, but it is important that it be said. In the Old
Testament, when the term "pour out God's wrath" is used, it is meant to include not only those
who persecute God's people but also His own people who are rebellious and covenant
breakers. Do not ever think that God's own people only mean Hebrews in the physical sense.
The Church has long ago decided that gentile Believers are also God's people although from a
spiritual, but not physical, sense and when taken in the proper balance, that is certainly correct.
So Believers, Jew or gentile, I exhort you to listen carefully to what I'm about to read to you.
CJB
Ezekiel 14:21-23
21
For here is what Adonai ELOHIM says: "Even if I inflict my four
dreadful judgments on Yerushalayim- sword, famine, wild animals and plagues- to
eliminate both its humans and its animals;
22
there will still be left a remnant in it to be
brought out, including both sons and daughters. When they come out to you, and you
see their way of life and how they act, then you will be consoled over the calamity I have
brought upon Yerushalayim, over everything I have done to it.
23
Yes, they will console you when you see their way of life and how they act; and you
will understand that it was not without good reason that I did what I did in
[Yerushalayim]," says Adonai ELOHIM.
CJB
Jeremiah 10:25
25
Pour out your anger on the nations that do not acknowledge you,
also on the families that do not call on your name. For they have consumed Ya'akov-
consumed him and finished him off, and laid waste to his home.
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CJB
Zephaniah 3:1-9
1
Woe to her who is filthy, defiled; woe to the tyrant city!
2
She
wouldn't listen to the voice, wouldn't receive correction; she didn't trust in ADONAI,
didn't draw close to her God.
3
Her leaders there with her are roaring lions, her judges
desert wolves, who don't leave even a bone for tomorrow.
4
Her prophets are reckless,
treacherous men; her cohanim profane the holy and do violence to Torah.
5
ADONAI, who is righteous, is there among them; he never does anything wrong. Every
morning he renders his judgment, every morning, without fail; yet the wrongdoer knows
no shame.
6
"I have cut off nations, their battlements are ruined; I have made their
streets ruins, no one walks in them. Their cities are destroyed, abandoned, unpeopled.
7
I said, 'Surely now you will fear me, you will receive correction'; so that her place will
not be cut off by all the punishments I brought on her. But no, they only grew all the
more eager to be corrupt in all that they do.
8
Therefore, wait for me," says ADONAI, "for
the day when I rise to witness against you, when I decide to assemble nations, to gather
kingdoms together, to pour on them my indignation, all my furious anger; for all the
earth will be consumed in the fire of my passion.
9
For then I will change the peoples, so that they will have pure lips, to call on the name
of ADONAI, all of them, and serve him with one accord.
And now a well known New Testament passage that sums up exactly what all that we have
been reading about portends. In this passage in Matthew Christ is speaking and He says:
CJB
Matthew 7:21-23
21
"Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord!' will enter the
Kingdom of Heaven, only those who do what my Father in heaven wants.
22
On that Day,
many will say to me, 'Lord, Lord! Didn't we prophesy in your name? Didn't we expel
demons in your name? Didn't we perform many miracles in your name?'
23
Then I will
tell them to their faces, 'I never knew you! Get away from me, you workers of
lawlessness!'
Who are these workers of lawlessness that Yeshua says He doesn't know? A better term that
captures exactly what lawlessness means in this case is Torah-lessness. Think about it. What
law are we to suppose Christ is referring to that if we shun it He'll disown us? Roman Law?
American Law? European Union Law? Sharia Law? Naturally it is the only law that meant
anything to Yeshua and ultimately should mean much of anything to us.... God's laws: the Law
of Moses. So "workers of lawlessness" are those who are disobedient to the covenant, and
disobedience to the covenant has played a front and center role throughout the last several
chapters of Revelation, as well as in the books of Daniel and Ezekiel upon which much of
Revelation depends. And what we learn is that when God pours out His wrath upon earth, both
the oppressors of God's people and those who consider themselves as God's people but in
fact are rebellious and are unrepentant covenant breakers are going to suffer it.
We'll talk about this a little more when we get to chapter 18 and we read of God's plea to His
people to "come out of her" so that they (we) too don't suffer from the plagues He is going to
inflict upon this planet and its wicked inhabitants.
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Since God is a God of patterns, we're going to see a very similar pattern emerge in the
carrying out of the Bowl Judgments that we saw earlier in chapter 8 concerning the Trumpet
Judgments. That is, whereas each blow of the Trumpet sent forth a judgment upon a particular
segment of our planet (the land, the salt water sea, the fresh water sources, and the sky), so
we find the same in chapter 16 with the Bowl Judgments.
The first Bowl Judgment, verse 2, was poured out upon the land and upon the land dwelling
creatures. Disgusting and painful sores broke out on all who wore the mark of the Beast and
those that worshipped his image. God's own people are warned in Revelation 14 not to take on
the mark of the Beast merely to survive; so this fits well with what we just discussed.
CJB
Revelation 14:11-13
11
and the smoke from their tormenting goes up forever and
ever. They have no rest, day or night, those who worship the beast and its image and
those who receive the mark of its name."
12
This is when perseverance is needed on the part of God's people, those who observe
his commands and exercise Yeshua's faithfulness.
13
Next I heard a voice from heaven saying, "Write: 'How blessed are the dead who die
united with the Lord, from now on!' 'Yes,' says the Spirit, 'now they may rest from their
efforts, for the things they have accomplished follow along with them.'"
We learn that covenant breakers and rebellious Believers will suffer just as pagans do for
wearing the mark of the Beast. Recall that while on the surface the mark (666) is said to control
all ability to buy and sell, in fact such a mark carries a far more ominous meaning to God; it
means allegiance to Satan. So God's people will not be able to take on the mark as a means to
save theirs' or their family's lives and then say: "'Lord, Lord! Didn't we prophesy in your
name? Didn't we expel demons in your name? Didn't we perform many miracles in your
name?'
The time of the reign of the Anti-Christ will be more horrible than any time ever known on earth
in all of history. And God will not accept as a legitimate excuse a parent making the choice to
take on the mark in the name of providing for his or her children and then saying, "but I only did
it as an act of love. In reality, God, my allegiance remains with you."
One of my favorite films is called The Kingdom of Heaven. Despite the name it really isn't a
religious movie; rather it is about a young man who lost his young pregnant wife to suicide and
then lost his way. He wanted to go to Jerusalem to seek forgiveness from God, and in a
strange set of circumstances became a knight for the Crusaders and went on to defend
Jerusalem from the Muslims led by the famous Islamic general Saladin. In one scene that has
always stuck with me, when it seemed certain that all was lost and in a day Saladin and his
hordes would break down the walls of the holy city, enter and massacre every Christian in it,
the Catholic Priest of Jerusalem recommended that the people convert to Islam now and
repent later. I have little doubt that similar advice will be given the world over from
overwhelmed, emotionally drained, and biblically challenged Pastors and Priests to their wholly
ignorant congregations. Accept the mark of the Beast now, they will say, for the love of your
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families and friends; and then repent later because God will understand because He is a God
of love.
Our Lord has taken every opportunity to tell us that such an attitude of His Believers will be
rejected as unworthy of salvation, and to attempt such a strategy will result in the same destiny
as for those who had never Believed. This tactic of claiming allegiance to God but behaving in
the opposite way and ignoring God's commandments is called lawlessness by Christ.
Yeshua has warned us that suffering and death may be the price to be paid in order to follow
Him. We in the West have really not experienced such a horrific choice and so we seem
immune to the suffering and murder of Christians in Africa and in the Middle East that are but
occasional blips in the news. In fact, the prospect doesn't seem like much more than a distant
or hypothetical warning, unlikely to happen, that merely means to emphasize how seriously we
need to take our relationship with Jesus. But at some point in the not-so-distant future,
according to John's Apocalypse, oppression for our trust in Messiah Yeshua will become the
law of the Anti-Christ and the world's population will join in carrying it out just as some of the
German citizenry helped carry out the Holocaust that murdered 6 million Jews in death camps.
So the precedent has already been set.
This 1st Bowl Judgment reminds us of the plague of boils upon the Egyptians that we find in
Exodus 9. Again; our Lord is a Lord of patterns and so it should not be surprising to find a
similar plague once again striking the oppressors of God's people for their stubborn refusal to
submit to the God of Israel. Interesting, isn't it, that since these people will take a mark on their
skin in order to buy, sell, and show their allegiance to Satan, that God will respond by filling
their bodies with His own marks; the marks of visible sores.....marks of God's judgment.... in
retribution for wearing the mark of the Beast. In many ways this affliction of painful sores fulfills
the same intent as the law of Tzara'at. Tzara'at, often misidentified as leprosy by Bible
translators, is a skin condition caused by God upon a person who He has deemed as inwardly
impure and worthy of shame. It exposes that person for who he or she really is. The idea is
that while one might think to look pious on the outside while harboring godlessness on the
inside, but God sees the heart. And when He deems the inner spiritual condition as too
unacceptable, He will afflict that person with a highly visible and gross skin disease that
essentially marks him or her as spiritually unclean.
In verse 3 the second angel of punishment poured out his bowl upon the salt water seas. The
water became like the blood of a dead person and so every bit of life in the sea died. The blood
of a dead person becomes thick and coagulated. While this is similar to the Exodus plague
upon the Egyptians, it is not identical in that it was the fresh water that was affected in Egypt
and it was affected because it was more the color of the water that seemed to make it
undrinkable. But, there is another aspect to this that Jewish Believers that read John's
Apocalypse would have immediately latched upon. It is that blood itself was forbidden to be
eaten, and that a dead person represented the height of ritual impurity. So as the salt water
became more blood-like, no Jew would continue fishing in it. And this is because they would
consider this contaminated condition of the oceans as akin to the uncleanness of a corpse.
Thus in the first Bowl Judgment when the sores on the skin of those who took the mark of the
Beast became like a person afflicted with Tzara'at..... and a person with Tzara'at was highly
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unclean and could not live among his family or society until it cleared up... now the world's
oceans and thus everything that came in contact with that water became impure and unclean
at the hand of God. Bottom line: God has declared, and physically marked, all of wicked
humanity with His mark of skin sores, and He has also marked all the world's oceans as
unclean by making them contaminated as with the blood of a dead person. This is perhaps the
harshest, most widespread judgment upon earth since the Great Flood.
This second Bowl Judgment is a much more serious plague than it's Trumpet Judgment
counterpart that also afflicted the salt water and it is hard to tell just how much of the world's
oceans shall be affected by it. We should notice that while there are indeed striking similarities
of the Bowl Judgments to the Trumpet Judgments, the Trumpet Judgments affected limited
specified portions of the globe, but not all. The Bowl Judgments seem to be universal in their
effects.
We'll continue with the Bowl Judgments, the final judgments of God, next time.
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