🔥 AN OVERVIEW OF THE BOOK OF REVELATION (PART 5)🔥

Mike Balloun teaches today. 12/16/23

🔥 AN OVERVIEW OF THE BOOK OF REVELATION (PART 5)🔥

VERSES: Matthew 24:15,21,22; Joel 2; Zechariah 13:8-9; Revelation 18:4

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AN OVERVIEW OF THE BOOK OF REVELATION PART 5

CHAPTERS 9-11
Keep in mind that as we go through the judgements of God that must take place, God is not discompassionate. It grieves His heart (as also seen throughout the Bible when God had to bring judgement to satisfy His holy Justice). The Book of Revelation can be read discompassionately or perceived as harsh because we have been so blinded to God’s Holiness and Justice. There’s a religious veil over our eyes and it takes the Holy Spirit to open our eyes to see the seriousness of this side of God and to comprehend the horrors of what is going to transpire upon the earth.

Being that there is no break up of chapters and verses in the original manuscript, we will begin with the last verse of Revelation Chapter 8… “And I beheld, and heard an angel flying through the midst of heaven, saying with a loud voice, Woe, woe, woe (the word ‘woe’ has a grief connotation that is directly tied to the Creator’s compassion; albeit it is impossible to circumvent His Justice and Holiness that demand the sentence), to the inhabiters of the earth by reason of the other voices of the trumpet of the three angels, which are yet to sound!” Chapter 9, Verse 1… “And the fifth angel sounded, and I saw a star fall from (the lower) heaven unto the earth: and to him was given the key of the bottomless pit.” (Note: stars can be typical of heavenly beings and angels - Job 38:7, Revelation 22:16)

The ‘star’ falling here is satan, to whom is given, by Christ, the key to the place of the “Bottomless Pit”, also referred to as the place called “Death.” (Revelation 1:18… “I am he that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell and of death.” With John 3:27… “John answered and said, A man can receive nothing, except it be given him from heaven.”)

This 5th Trumpet sounds and signals in the time of the 3 judgement ‘woes’ which will bring us to the end of God’s Wrath. It is the beginning time of the Great Tribulation/Jacob’s Trouble. (Jeremiah 30:7… “Alas! for that day is great, so that none is like it: it is even the time of Jacob's trouble, but he shall be saved out of it.” See also Matthew 24:15,21,22… “When ye therefore shall see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, stand in the holy place, (whoso readeth, let him understand)… For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be. And except those days should be shortened, there should no flesh be saved: but for the elect's sake those days shall be shortened.”) It is half-way or 3 ½ years since Israel’s 7-year Covenant of Death and Hades was entered into and is now broken by the ‘prince’. (Isaiah 28:15,18… “Because ye have said, We have made a covenant with death, and with hell are we at agreement; when the overflowing scourge shall pass through, it shall not come unto us: for we have made lies our refuge, and under falsehood have we hid ourselves…” … “And your covenant with death shall be disannulled, and your agreement with hell shall not stand; when the overflowing scourge shall pass through, then ye shall be trodden down by it.” Daniel 9:27… “And he shall confirm the covenant with many for one week: and in the midst of the week (middle of the last 7 years) he shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease, and for the overspreading of abominations he shall make it desolate, even until the consummation, and that determined shall be poured upon the desolate.”)

Compare this opening verse of Revelation 9 of satan falling from heaven to Earth and receiving the key to the Bottomless Pit (the place called Death in Hades) with Revelation 12:7-9,12 when satan is cast out of the first heaven down to this Earth. “And there was war in (this Earth’s) heaven: Michael and his angels fought against the dragon; and the dragon fought and his angels, And prevailed not; neither was their place found any more in heaven. And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him….. Therefore rejoice, ye heavens, and ye that dwell in them. Woe to the inhabitants of the earth and of the sea, because the devil has come down to you (Luke 10:18), having great wrath, knowing that he has only a short time (3 ½ years). [Revelation 12:7-9,12] These verses, and Daniel 12:1, are the same event. “And at that time shall Michael stand up, the great prince which standeth for the children of thy people: and there shall be a time of trouble, such as never was since there was a nation even to that same time: and at that time thy people shall be delivered, every one that shall be found written in the book.” Note that Luke 10:18 also refers to the same event… “And he (Jesus) said unto them, I (prophetically) beheld Satan as lightning fall from heaven.”

The time of satan/that star being expelled from this Realm’s unseen heaven corresponds with and ignites the first of these 3 ‘woes’. (Revelation 9:12) In that satan, having acquired the key, is now opening up the Bottomless Pit and releasing the Anti-Christ Beast of Revelation 13:1,4 who supernaturally rises up to the Earth into the flesh of man with all the power and authority of satan and shortly kills the Two Witnesses half way through the 7-year ‘Last Days’. (Revelation 11:3,7)
The Anti-Christ is likely Apollyon (meaning the Destroyer) of Revelation 9:11… “And they had a king over them, which is the angel of the bottomless pit, whose name in the Hebrew tongue is Abaddon, but in the Greek tongue hath his name Apollyon.” (Note that the word “angel” in Revelation 9:11 is the same Greek word ἄγγελόν {angelon} used in Matthew 11:10, Galatians 4:14, and elsewhere which speak of human “messengers.”) He is the king over the forces released from the underworld. Abaddon is also the Hebrew name for the ‘Bottomless Pit’… and so it is from there, that the Last Days’ king over the Earth seemingly takes his name. (See Daniel 8:24-25) The Holy Spirit had instructed the Apostles to write the Gospel of Christ in Greek as opposed to Hebrew to appeal unto the Gentiles, but here He puts forth the name in both Greek and Hebrew. As now, in Jacob’s Trouble, He is showing Himself in the Book of Revelation in “THE THINGS WHICH SHALL BE HEREAFTER” as turning now (after 2000 years) to address Israel again, as well as continuing His appeal to the remaining Church and Gentiles on the Earth.

The “Bottomless Pit”/“Death” in Hades is a place for some of the departed souls of men to be imprisoned, before and now. It is one Place where Christ had descended to after dying on the Cross (Acts 2:31, Ephesians 4:9) and from where the man/the Anti-Christ and the man/False Prophet ascend. (See 2nd Thessalonians 2:3-4 and Revelation 13:1,11 which describe the Beast rising up out of the sea and the False prophet coming up out of the earth. Both these being men who have lived once and are resurrected/resuscitated out from the pit where they have had a long time to get into the state of being wholly set against God.)

As the Father opened the Heaven and the Christ descended, satan opens the Bottomless Pit of Hades and the Anti-Christ ascends. It is that same dreadful Place wherein the demons were afraid that Jesus would send them. (Luke 8:28,31… “When he saw Jesus, he cried out, and fell down before him, and with a loud voice said, What have I to do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of God most high? I beseech thee, torment me not… And they besought him that he would not command them to go out into the deep.”) It is the prison Place where satan is to be chained and cast at the end of the Great Tribulation/Jacob’s Trouble and will be loosed from for a “little season” at the end of the Millennial Age. (Revelation 20:1-3) Both prisoners and tormentors are now to be loosed from the Bottomless Pit, as many as are allowed by God’s declared Justice judgements. To their being literal ‘creatures’ it can be said that it is so, without absurdity, given we have their type as precedent in the Old Testament. (Exodus 10:4; 23:28, Deuteronomy 7:20, and Joshua 24:12) But their stings are far worse than those of the hornets which God had sent in droves as invading tormentors in the Old Testament, they are like the painful stings of scorpions. They torment any unsealed of mankind relentlessly for 5 months. (Revelation 9:4… “And it was commanded them that they should not hurt the grass of the earth, neither any green thing, neither any tree; but only those men which have not the seal of God in their foreheads.”) The demonic characteristics of the invading ‘locust’ creatures are frightening. They are directed by the king of the Abyss and are as mighty as battle horses, and protected by iron breast plates, like kingly steeds. They are restricted in their assignment… they are therefore not without intelligence, as they also are likened unto man, but with women’s hair… they are ferocious of heart as depicted by the teeth like that of a lion, and can easily kill, but will only be allowed to inflict tormenting pain like scorpions. In several respects, they are reminiscent of the Joel 2 hosts.

Revelation 9:12 “One -- woe is past; and, behold, there come two woes more hereafter. Verse 13… And the sixth angel sounded (and the events from this Verse until Revelation 11:14 are during the 6th Trumpet and are the 2nd woe), and I heard a voice from the four horns of the golden altar which is before God, Saying to the sixth angel which had the trumpet, Loose (in the Wrath of God) the four (wicked and murderous) angels which are bound (mercifully now) in (at in the Greek) the great river Euphrates.”

The Altar before God, then in the Last Days, is without the shielding Veil. There is no New Covenant blood on the Altar Horns to cry out for mercy. Even the murderer is to be pulled from the Altar Horn in this merging day of Justice. (1st Kings 1:50-53; 2:29-32) The entire Earth has become like unto the underworld’s Bottomless Pit and falls under the Justice of God. And for the year and a month and a day and an hour the 200,000,000 will kill.

(Regarding the killing by the 2,000,000,000 - Jeremiah 4:16-31 comes to mind.)

3) Revelation 10 “…another mighty angel” lays claim to Land and Sea. That which speaks to the “mystery of God” that will be fully finished during the sounding of the voice of the 7th Angel. (Verse 7)

To what may we say answers to all the preceding and following destruction and death? Chiefly it answers to the Creator’s ancient determination and mysterious Plan… “That in the dispensation (arrangement of a household) of the fulness of times (seasons) he might gather together in one (government) all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; even in him: In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestined (predetermined) according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will.” (Ephesians 1:10-11) With… “And to make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ: To the intent that now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known by the church the manifold wisdom of God, According to the eternal purpose which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord…” (Ephesians 3:9-11)

And having fully accomplished the Mystery of His Will, His eternal purpose, through His Christ/the Son of God Son of Man (that of His foreseen designed means of the progressive fabrication of a new creature into His Son’s image, ultimately bringing many faithful overcoming ruling sons unto resurrection glory… Hebrews 2:10), He now turns to His victorious Son to reclaim this fallen Realm again, as now He is to be joined by His victorious Bride. It needs to be understood that God, before the foundation of this present World (Ephesians 1:4) desired to create a living being/a new creature, that would have the inherent ability, through the power of choice, to develop character. (Every one of us redeemed and empowered have the potential through choosing to deny and crucify the character of the Old Man and willingly yielding our souls in obedient service in faith to His Written Word). This character development of Christlikeness being God’s predetermined condition necessary unto co-ruling firstborn sonship/Brideship in the future Theocratic Government to be established in the Kingdom of Christ in the Earth and its related heaven. These overcomers are to be the firstborn sons of God and Bride of Christ who will be filled in resurrection with His glory, and will worthily replace the wicked and rebellious angels now ruling in the heaven associated with this Earth, and on this Earth. In that understanding of what God has done, we can further apprehend the deep hatred satan has for Man.

The Mystery of God’s Will (to bring all under Christ) is accomplished in accordance with His predetermined timeline… which is to say in the fulness of times/prophetically revealed seasons that encompasses this current Age of Grace and Mercy, to be followed soon by the short season or time of Judgements in the ‘Last Days’/the 7-year 70th week of Daniel’s prophecy, followed by the season of the Millennial Reign of the King of kings, followed by satan’s short release, and then his eternal incarceration, the Great White Throne, and finally this Earth and heavens pass away. This competes the fulness of times/seasons that God has set to accomplish the fullness of the Mystery of His Will; it will have finally traveled over 7000 years of seasons in which the Earth, in its recreated state, and since the creation of man, will have been in existence.

The “Last Days” setting in represents God’s Mercy and Grace having finally been exhausted in the Earth. God’s purpose for extending mercy and grace to Mankind through Christ was for every willing man to secure by faith (justification for eternal life) AND faithfulness (sanctification) unto a glorious eternal inheritance with Christ. But now His grace and mercy has been exhausted in the Earth, by Israel, the Church, and the Gentiles. Said another corresponding way, the Mystery of God’s times/seasons encompassed the prophesied increasingly wicked environment on Earth. The Mystery of Lawlessness has brought to the conclusion God’s pre-designed purposes. The Mystery of Lawlessness (which began in Babel and is that which the Book of Revelation calls “Mystery Babylon”) is what God predicted would exponentially grow worse and worse until when in the fullness of time/His season of mercy and grace in the Earth would be exhausted. It is a system designed by Satan to thwart God’s will that runs concurrently with and counter to the extending of God’s mercy and grace.

That which is foretold, promised, and threatened in Scripture, God will now, in these appointed Last Days, bring to pass. With His now inescapable Justice and Holiness, He will avenge in order to balance the scales of His extended Grace and Mercy (for these 1000’s of years), and fulfill His mysterious Salvation Plan. God will purposefully and exponentially balance His mercy and grace quickly with his Holiness and Justice during the last 3 ½ years.

The similar ‘days of Noah’ have come into view. The blood shed by man and beast since the Covenant of Noah must now be accounted for in these Last Days’ Judgements. The scales will be balanced as all the unavenged blood that was spilled, from Noah’s day to today, will require vengeance/recompense. However, the ‘Rainbow’ promises of God to Noah and his seed offsets the comparable total destruction. (Genesis 9:6-17) These Last Days’ judgements will also serve to answer to Israel’s breaking of their Covenant with its threatened exponential wrath. (See Leviticus 25:8-26:28, where in the last verse, they are warned if they continue to walk contrarily to Him, God says, “Then I will walk contrary unto you also in fury; and I, even I, will chastise you seven times (7-fold) for your sins.”) Nevertheless, as with the Covenant with Noah, in the Last Days, God will also remember His Covenant with Abraham, and a remnant of his seed shall survive. (See Genesis 22:15-18 where God promised Abraham unconditionally that all the nations of the Earth will be blessed through his seed due to his merit of being willing to sacrifice his son Isaac. See also Zechariah 13:8-9, which is an awful indictment/sentence on Israel, but where God speaks of sparing a remnant of his seed… “And it shall come to pass, that in all the land, saith the Lord, two parts therein shall be cut off and die; but the third (a remnant) shall be left therein. And I will bring the third part through the fire, and will refine them as silver is refined, and will try them as gold is tried: they shall call on my name, and I will hear them: I will say, It is my people: and they shall say, The Lord is my God.”). So God keeps His irrevocable Covenant Promises to Noah and to Abraham. Those Covenants are what offsets His Wrath from total destruction, and not God’s mercy and grace anymore (which answers to Mark 13:22 and Matthew 24:22). For example, the sealing of the 12,000 from each tribe is the result of God keeping His Covenant Promise to Abraham in order to preserve a remnant of his seed and bless the peoples of the earth through them.

These last close to 3 ½ years (the Great Tribulation) also answer to the Lord’s New Testament declaration of the “hour of temptation which shall come upon all the world, to try them that dwell upon the earth.” (Revelation 3:10) Those remaining living redeemed of the Nation of the One New Man who did not escape that “hour”, who did not keep His Word of patience, and were not a part of the living caught up First Fruits, have now fallen under the Judgements of God for living unfaithfully and presumptuously. “For if we sin willfully (with an attitude of apathy towards sinning) after that we have received the knowledge of the truth (of the Atonement of Christ), there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins, But a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversaries (these lukewarm will receive judgement alongside God’s adversaries). He that despised Moses’ law died without mercy under two or three witnesses: Of how much sorer punishment, suppose ye, shall he be thought worthy, who hath trodden under foot the Son of God, and hath counted the blood of the covenant (Testament in Greek), wherewith he was sanctified, an unholy thing, and hath done despite unto the Spirit of grace? For we know him that hath said, Vengeance belongeth unto me, I will recompense, saith the Lord. And again, The Lord shall judge his people. It is a fearful thing to fall into the (judgement) hands of the living God.” [Hebrews 10:26-31] (Is our fearfulness of God enough to offset our apathy or lethargy? Are we fighting? Are we wrestling in a spiritual battle?)

Revelation 3:16… “So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth.” Though a person who is redeemed is not condemned eternally, it does not save them from God’s fiery indignation that He judges His people with. Their failure to run the race in developing holy character like Christ and to not heed the call to “Come out” of spiritual Babylon with its religious deceptive doctrines, and choosing to follow the character of the flesh, the world, and satan, disqualifies them from escaping the hour of temptation as a part of those caught up to the first heaven in the “manchild/first fruits”, making them hypocrites, false witnesses, and worthy subjects of the stings of the scorpion creatures or worthy subjects to be killed by the 2,000,000,000 horsemen with the rest of the then living people upon the Earth. These Christians will have presumptuously and critically appraised the mercy and grace of God’s Christ and did not heed the many New Testament warnings to spiritual maturity and grew cold in love and lukwearm service, and so will now fall under the judgements of God’s Holiness and Justice. We can’t come to the Throne of grace critically appraising God’s goodness extended in the Atonement of Christ and still obtain mercy and grace to cover our sins. A right heart is needed to approach the Throne; an an appreciative contrite heart desiring to be Christlike and actively fighting the World, the flesh, and the devil. By presumptuously trodding underfoot and shunning the sanctifying Blood of Jesus, there is nothing to offset your sins after having been redeemed, thus we disqualify ourselves for not running the race in holiness unto the prize of resurrection glory lawfully. Again, during this period, which is a transition back to the Justice of the Mosaic Covenant; mercy and grace has been exhausted. Revelation 18:4 says, “And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues.”

These Days also answer to the living unredeemed Gentiles who refused the Grace and Mercy of God extended to them in Christ, and who then are justly dealt with. (Revelation 11:18b) And last but definitely not least, these Last Days answer to the unseen spirit powers on high cast down to the Earth to be judged like men. (Speaking to angels, God said in Psalm 82:6-7… “I have said, Ye are gods; and all of you are children of the most High. But ye shall die like men, and fall like one of the princes.” Isaiah 24:21-23… “And it shall come to pass in that day, that the Lord shall punish the host of the high ones that are on high, and the kings of the earth upon the earth. And they shall be gathered together, as prisoners are gathered in the pit, and shall be shut up in the prison, and after many days shall they be visited. Then the moon shall be confounded, and the sun ashamed, when the Lord of hosts shall reign in mount Zion, and in Jerusalem, and before his ancients gloriously.” Revelation 12:9… “And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.”)

All these declared Justice judgements, administrated to no greater or lesser degree, but exactly measured, transpire in the shortest time possible, in that they shall now continue without interruption unto completely satisfying God’s Justice and Holiness. All is committed unto Christ alone. When Justice according to God’s Holiness has been met, the “Mystery of God” will have been finished. Christ’s Millennial Kingdom with His co-ruling heirs is then to be established upon that foundation of Justice, which will be the Millennial Kingdom standard. (Revelation 2:26-27; 12:5)

The Cries of the Seven Thunders spoke things that are secret to God but are yet to be uttered and fulfilled in the last 3 ½ years. That comes forth before the 3rd woe as a part of the 2nd Woe and between the 6th and 7th Trumpet, that prepares for the final 3rd woe. That 3rd woe, from one point of view, corresponds with the great liberating last plague upon Egypt that just precedes the Greater ‘Passover’ of Israel out of all the Nations of the Earth. Revelation 10:7 (with Revelation 11:15) “…in the days of the voice of the seventh angel, when he shall begin to sound (during or within that time), the MYSTERY of God should be finished, as he hath declared to his servants the prophets.”

What is this Mystery of God revealed by the Old and New Testament prophets to God’s redeemed Children, yet hidden from the undiscerning paganized Church?
The Mystery of God is most fully revealed in Paul’s gospel, but few in the New Testament Church for 17 centuries have understood or proclaimed it. (Romans 16:25-27) As stated above, the mysteries having to do with God’s purposes for creating Man to rule in this Realm, set out 6 Millenniums ago in the Book of Genesis, mysteriously have the ‘7th Millennial Kingdom Sabbath’ rule and rest of Christ in view. (Genesis 2:2-3, Matthew 13:11, Luke 8:10, Ephesians 1, Hebrews 3&4) That mystery (of the Kingdom of God) includes ‘Eve’/the Bride of Christ ruling in and from the first heaven of this Earth as well as on the Earth. That Gospel Mystery includes the 2000-year-old high calling for “overcomers” out of the living redeemed ‘Body of Christ,’ in generation after generation. They, having received the gift of eternal redemption by faith, were then called to be faithful servants, to develop the character of Christ, and to be victorious over the flesh, devil, and the world. If they grasped the hope for promised glory, allowing it to purify them, they would be found worthy to be caught up to that heavenly Tribunal Throne as that glory-filled New Creature. It is the Bride clothed in her righteousness through service that is to wed the Bridegroom and Co-rule in His Millennial Kingdom from this Realm’s unseen heaven. (1st Corinthians 15:48-49, Revelation 19:7… “Let us be glad and rejoice, and give honour to him: for the marriage of the Lamb is come, and his wife hath made herself ready.”)

That present hardly-known Gospel Calling is in conjunction with the mystery of the present hardening but future glorious restoration of Israel to rule on the Earth. (Romans 11:25-32… “For I would not, brethren, that ye should be ignorant of this mystery, lest ye should be wise in your own conceits; that blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in. And so all Israel shall be saved: as it is written, There shall come out of Sion the Deliverer, and shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob: For this is my covenant unto them, when I shall take away their sins. As concerning the gospel, they are enemies for your sakes: but as touching the election, they are beloved for the father's sakes. For the gifts and calling of God are without repentance (irrevocable). For as ye in times past have not believed God, yet have now obtained mercy through their unbelief: Even so have these also now not believed, that through your mercy they also may obtain mercy. For God hath concluded them all in unbelief, that he might have mercy upon all.” See also Jeremiah 31:31-34)

The End-Times “mystery of God’ to then be finished and fully known is being contrasted in the Book of Revelation with “Mystery Babylon”, depicted in Revelation Chapters 17&18, which answers to “the mystery of Lawlessness” that is at work. It is the ancient satanically designed system to thwart God’s intent for a Theocratic Kingdom in this Realm. It is currently and more and more effectively at work. (2nd Thessalonians 2:7… “For the mystery of iniquity doth already work: only he who now letteth will let, until he be taken out of the way.”) That mystery of iniquity from ancient Babel also will then be fully exposed and eliminated, to the awakening sorrow of many merely redeemed Christians now presumptuously asleep. (Revelation 3:16-17)

Chapter 10 Verse 7 occurs during the 6th trump and 2nd woe, when the narrative pauses and foretells that it is not now at this point that the Mysteries of God, declared by His prophets should be finished… (in that even more of that Mystery to be manifested in the Last Days’ 7th Trumpet judgements should by necessity now be set forth by His prophet John given to him in the “little book”… sweet it was in supernatural apprehension of God’s Salvation Plan, but bitter the thought of its Judgement application. Knowledge of prophecy, and purifying oneself, can be the means of escape from the woe). But it is not until the sounding of the 7th Trumpet and the 3rd woe that the wonderous mysteries of God’s ‘reconciliation of all things’ should be finished.

So it is not until after the 2nd woe is completed in Revelation 11:14 (that began in Revelation 9:13-14 with the loosing of the 4 wicked angels and 200,000,000 horsemen that covered 1yr, 1month, 1day, and one hour), that the 3rd woe in the 7th trump (that was referred to in Revelation 10:7 to finish the mystery of God)… now begins in Revelation 11:15 as the 7th trump then begins to sound… “And the seventh angel sounded; and there were great voices in heaven, saying, The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ; and he shall reign for ever and ever.” Then the narrative gives us a quick glimpse into the first heaven in the next 4 Verses, (Revelation 11:16-19… “And the four and twenty elders, which sat before God on their seats, fell upon their faces, and worshipped God, Saying, We give thee thanks, O Lord God Almighty, which art, and wast, and art to come; because thou hast taken to thee thy great power, and hast reigned. And the nations were angry, and thy wrath is come, and the time of the dead, that they should be judged, and that thou shouldest give reward unto thy servants the prophets, and to the saints, and them that fear thy name, small and great; and shouldest destroy them which destroy the earth. And the temple of God was opened in heaven, and there was seen in his temple the ark of his testament: and there were lightnings, and voices, and thunderings, and an earthquake, and great hail.”

So the 7th trumpet begins to sound in 11:14, and then Verses 15-19 reveal what may be anticipated as the consequences that will be fully discovered throughout the 7th Trumpet sounding (which is concurrent with the 3rd woe), before now pausing in the chronological narrative with the first Verse of Chapter 12. Remember that Chapters 12-14 are parenthetically inserted to expound on the details, and are parenthetically redirecting our mind back to previous events that set the stage or caused what is about to occur following the sounding of the 7th Trumpet. The narrative in Chapters 12-14 turns and begins to backfill with detail beginning with describing the Last Days’ event leading to the Middle of the Tribulation War in the first heaven that preceded satan/the star having been cast down. And then it details the further events following his being cast down. That being, namely, his immediate ‘raising’ up of the Anti-Christ and the False Prophet from the Bottomless Pit.

Note that up until this mid-point of the 7-year covenant by the ‘Prince/Beast’ with apostate Israel, Israel has been making reinstituted Old Testament sacrifices upon the reconstructed altar. It is then that the risen Beast turns on Israel, kills the Two Witnesses of God, commits the “abomination of desolation”, and begins the murderous pursuit of the Woman’s (the symbolic ‘Woman’ of Revelation 12) remaining seed. This is followed by the narrative of events during the Anti-Christ’s and False Prophet’s “short time” careers (of 3 ½ years) after the First-Fruits were caught up to God in the first heaven, when the remaining seed of God’s two peoples on the Earth (Jews and remaining Christians) must patiently endure until the Harvest (which occurs between the 6th and 7th Vial), after which the Vintage of God’s Wrath will be completed upon His enemies. This ends the parenthetical overview of Chapters 12-14.

Now John picks up again chronologically in Revelation Chapters 15 & 16 with what was paused in Chapter 11 Verse 15, and he describes the pouring out of Judgement Vials by which God crushes the head of His adversary and recovers this Realm (in fulfillment of Genesis 3:15 and also sets the stage for the fulfillment of Matthew 6:10… “Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.”) The Wrath of God is completed in the pouring out of the Vial judgements and the mysteries declared to His Old and New Testament prophets are completely unveiled and fully discernable in His Written Word.

Going back to Revelation 11:15-19… (which first gave an overview of what will be the reaction of the sounding of the 7th Trump in the first heaven as God begins to exhibit His great power and also the proclamation of what will have been accomplished in the time of the swift and overpowering judgements of the Vials, all the way up to Christ’s Second Coming down to Earth.) The 3rd woe will take us to the Second Coming of Christ and the Millennial Kingdom. The sounding of the 7th Trumpet’s long blast continues to sound all the way until the fullness of God’s Restoration Plan is manifest, until the vanishing away of the present Earth. It will take us to the End of all pertaining to this present Earth, the End of the Millennial Kingdom of Christ’s reign, the judging of all the remaining dead, and even unto the New Heavens and Earth. Those things being spoken of in Revelation 11:15-19 are… 1) the Harvest, which includes the faithful surviving Christians living along with the faithful among the dead found worthy in “the heavenly calling”, brought up from among the dead to the first heaven in the “First Resurrection” in reward of faithfulness of service. (Luke 20:34-36, Luke 14:14, Matthew 5:11-12) 2) the enemies of God rage, incited by satan (Psalm 2); to which God answers in His Wrath, and the destructive spirits and rebellious of mankind and their strongholds on Earth are destroyed 3) His rewarding of prophets, saints, God-fearers, small and great, in the actual Return of Christ to the Earth (Revelation 22:12… “And, behold, I come quickly; and my reward is with me, to give every man according as his work shall be.” Revelation 19:9… “…Blessed are they which are called unto the marriage supper of the Lamb.”) 4) Jews receive Jesus as their Messiah and the restoration of Israel and Jerusalem quickly follows. 5) The goat and sheep Nations are judged by the Lord Who then is found sitting on His Millennial Throne of Glory. (Matthew 25:31-32)

It is then that the Jews and Israel’s afflictions will cease forever.
(Isaiah 13&14, Jeremiah 50&51) It is then that the City of Jerusalem is to be established as the world’s Center. There are no more wars on the Earth, and peace and plenty will prevail in restored Nature. Israel and Jerusalem will have supremacy on the Earth forever, according to the Covenant of Abraham.

4) Last comments that summarize Chapter 11…
The Two Last Days’ Prophets of God have re-appeared in the judgement power of the Old Testament in the first half or 3 ½ years of Israel’s Covenant with Death (probably Elijah and Enoch, neither of them having died - Malachi 4:5-6, Mark 9:11-13). The Gentiles had been permitted in the Outer Court as a part of the 7-year treaty, as it was in the days of old. (Revelation 11:2) The deceptive and pretentious Anti-Christ emerges among those Gentile worshipers, kills the Two Witnesses, and takes unto himself the ‘Temple’ worship and declares his universal religion, taking the City and ravaging its Jewish inhabitants and pursuing those who flee. (Matthew 24:15-22, Zechariah 13:8-9) Mystic Babylon is unleashed. 3 ½ days pass when the Two Witnesses’ bodies are restored to life and raised up into the air/first heaven and the Judicial Throne. Revelation 11:13-14… “And the same hour was there a great earthquake, and the tenth part of the city fell, and in the earthquake were slain of men seven thousand: and a remnant were affrighted, and gave glory to the God of heaven. The second woe is past; and, behold, the third woe cometh quickly.” It is then quickly/shortly that the 7th Angel begins to sound the 7th Trumpet (Verse 15) in which the 3rd woe judgements encompass the destruction of the Anti-Christ.

The Age of Mercy and Grace is seen to be closing in His Last Days’ Two Witnesses who come in the power and authority of the Old Testament, evidenced by the kinds of judgements being exhibited and is sure testimony that a transition has occurred from the Age of Grace and Mercy to the Age of Justice and Righteousness wherein Christ and His Co-Rulers will soon rule with a rod of iron (where there is no qualifying command as in the New Testament of turning of the other cheek, or taking no thought of a suffered wrong).

The Two Witnesses’ gospel is one of promoting God‘s Kingdom and Righteousness on Earth. Their ministry is associated with the ‘Jewish’ God of the Old Testament.
The Tribunal Throne of Judgement is in place and the new Age of Justice in His Law is dawning. The Two Jewish Witnesses, dressed in sackcloth, preach a God of Righteousness (and of coming judgement, demanding Israel/people to turn from sin, as all prophets did before God sent His judgement) and they cause the rain to cease, waters to be turned to blood, and more… even devouring their enemies with fire. (Revelation 11:3-6) The 3 ½ yearlong Message of the Two Jewish Witnesses is of God’s Messianic Kingdom in Justice to be re-established on the Earth, but it ends in their murder by the ‘resurrected’ Anti-Christ. The Two Witnesses’ message was not of a Father in Heaven looking for a Bride for His Son; for that Age has all but passed, but of the imminent coming of the Jewish Messiah to Rule over the Earth.

Grace and Mercy has failed upon the World, and now Justice is to be administrated as the Lion of the Tribe of Judah intends to smite. His vesture will be dipped in the blood of His foes. The World rejoices when the Anti-Christ kills the Two Ministers demanding righteousness. (Note that it is not surprising that Scripture paints the picture of the Anti-Christ being joyously celebrated and even worshipped when he kills the Two Witnesses. First, because no one else was able to kill them, and secondly, because the World saw them as the cause of all the judgements that came on the Earth during those first 3 ½ years. Their Ministry doesn’t speak to a “good God” in the World’s eyes, which in practicality is the god of this World that allows them to do whatever they like, and therefore, they hardened their hearts to their prophesying.) But the Two dead Witnesses are caught up alive to the lower heaven unto Christ and the Administrative Throne of Justice. Followed by a great earthquake, 7000 men are slain (not necessarily a literal number), and a small remnant wondrously affrighted, gives glory to God.

Typically: Moses and Aaron were God’s ‘two witnesses’ before Egypt and its Pharaoh, manifesting the judgement power of God. Here, their counterparts are Elijah and Enoch that preach the justice of the Law and the coming of the Messiah to Rule in exacting Justice.

Israel is viewed as ‘unclean’ as a result of the dead body of Jesus (Whose righteous Blood also cries out against them), yet a Second Passover is prescribed in the Law by God for those who were defiled in the first Passover. (Numbers 9:6-14) The blood of the Two Witnesses answers in a way to the Passover blood to the sincere wannabe lawkeepers of Israel (not in atonement per se, but effective towards these remnant Jews who give glory to God, who heed their message, repent, and flee). Many are slain in the streets of Jerusalem by the Anti-Christ who ascends out of the Bottomless Pit. The great earthquake and 7000 men slain in Jerusalem answers to the shed blood of the Two Witnesses in the same hour of their resurrection, as the sealed are untouched, and is typical to the Egyptians’ first born dead. (Revelation 11:13a) And the announcement of the 3rd and final woe to follow begins, which will answer to the pursuing persecutors of Egypt drowning in the Red Sea. (Revelation 12:16 with 19:20-21) It will be God’s means in destroying the Beast and False Prophet personally, as well as the destruction of the confederated Beast Nations, freeing the Earth from satanic-inspired tyranny.