Revelation 14:6-7 The First Angels
Message
Revelation 14:8 The Second Angel's
Message
Revelation 14:9-12 The Third Angel's
Message
The
Interpretation of the First Angel's Message:The good news of God's love for man has been preached in every age, but the first angel of Revelation 14 presents a part of God's everlasting gospel, or Good News, that could be understood only near the close of history when He would begin His special work of judgment on mankind. The key to understanding the judgment brought to view by the first angel is found the everlasting gospel that God has reconciled mankind to Himself through the death of Jesus Christ. The Bible declares that all men have sinned and fallen short of God's glory. But the Good News is that the divine Son of God became one with us, and though He Himself never sinned, He voluntarily accepted our guilt and the punishment we deserve for separating ourselves from God. Jesus died that we might live. On the cross He made a perfect and complete atonement, a sacrifice sufficient to cover every sin and reconcile all men to God (Isaiah 53:5,6).
Then after His resurrection, having already obtained eternal redemption for every man, He ascended to heaven to present before His Father the efficacy of His sacrifice and the perfect righteousness He had wrought out for us (Hebrews 9:12).
Because of this the New Testament clearly teaches that men can be "justified" before God, or counted as righteous, solely on the basis of Christ's infinite merits, His perfect righteousness. In recognition of the faith of those willing to trust Him alone for justification before God, Christ sends His Holy Spirit to dwell with in their hearts and make effectual in them the salvation He has wrought out for them on calvary (Ephesians 1:12; Acts 2:38). Thus, whenever a person accepts Christ as his righteousness, he will experience a change in his life. True justification is always made evident by good works, in keeping the commandments of God.
This is the essence of the everlasting gospel; Man is justified before God solely on the basis of the perfect merits of Christ alone. To those who will receive Him in this way, Christ will impart His righteousness, and the believer thus becomes a true worshiper of God the Creator.
The sanctuary and its services indicate that Christ's mediation for us has two phases of His mediation for us when He ascended to heaven in AD 31. At that time He entered the holy place of the heavenly sanctuary to give forgiveness and reconciliation to men. Thus His mediation in the first part of the sanctuary showed His death on Calvary to be sufficient to cover the guilt of men and give them forgiveness.
But the Bible clearly teaches that it is possible for men to turn away from God after receiving forgiveness (see John 15:5; Ezekiel 18:20-24; Hebrews 10:28, 29). Also though Christ forgives the sins of men when they confess them, there still remains a record in certain "books" in heaven (Daniel 7:10; Malachi 3:16; Psalms 56:8).
In AD 1844 Jesus Christ entered the most holy place in the heavenly sanctuary for the purpose of blotting out these records so that His people might have a full title to heaven, completely free of any encumbrances. His work for His people in the judgment involves at least four aspects.
1. Just as God had the ancient Israelites gather about the earthly sanctuary once each year for the Day of Atonement, or day of judgment, so He is now - through the presentation of the three messages of Revelation 14 - inviting His people to gather about the heavenly sanctuary and enter by faith in Christ into the most Holy place and receive the benefits of His mediation. And just as God specified certain things for the ancient Israelites to do when they assembled for the Day of Atonement, so the first angel calls upon those living during the time of the true judgment to "fear God, and give glory to him." Those who worship the beast described in Revelation 13 will give glory to man, but those who understand the everlasting gospel will give praise and honor and glory to God alone.
In addition, the first angel calls upon those preparing for the judgment to "worship him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and fountains of waters." Since the judgment began in 1844, almost the great foundation of Christianity, the true God created all things and that He alone is the source of life.
The words "worship him that made heaven and earth" are based on the fourth commandment of God's eternal law of love, which invites men to join the Creator in His Sabbath, or rest. On the seventh day of Creation, the Bible says, God "rested", and was refreshed. He looked upon His perfect work and felt satisfied. (See Genesis 1:31; 2:1-3 Exodus 20:8-11; 31:17.) The angels who looked upon His perfect work shouted for joy (Job 38:7)
2. Christ's work in the judgment also involves an investigation of the lives of all who have ever professed to serve Him through out human history. During this investigation Christ and His Father will compare every thought, word, and deed of these individuals with perfect requirement of the law of love (see Daniel 7;10; Malachi 3:16; James 2:12)
3. In this pre-Advent judgment Christ will either "blot out" the records of the individual's sins or his name from the book of life. Those who have refused to trust fully in Christ alone, who have failed to confess all their sins and receive forgiveness, will have their names blotted out of the book of life (see Revelation 3:5; Ezekial 18:24; Exodus 32:33)
But many will have repented of their sins and by faith claimed Christ's perfect sacrifice as their only source of justification before God. God will count these penitent ones fully worthy to be in His eternal kingdom. Jesus will then blot out the records of their sins through the merits of His atoning sacrifice, bringing to a complete fulfillment the new covenant promise: "I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more" (Jeremiah 31:34; see also Jeremiah 50:20 and Isaiah 4:2,3). This work of atonement by the judgment will thus remove the false from the book of the life and will clear all the genuine followers of God before the unfallen beings of the universe.
4. In conjunction with His work of blotting out the record of sin, Christ will bestow His Holy Spirit in its fullness upon the living who have followed Him by faith into the most holy place and accepted His mediation for them (see Acts 3:19). And He will cloth faithful ones with His own righteousness, so that He can present them to His Father "a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing" (Ephessins 5:27; see also Zechariah 3:1-5 and Revelation 14:1-5)
The
Interpretation of the Second Angel's Message:The second of the three messages of Revelation 14 points out that Babylon is fallen. When ancient Babylon rejected God, He announced to its leaders, You have been weighed in the balances and found wanting" (Daniel 5:27, RSV). Shortly thereafter the Medes and Persians attached the city of Babylon and overthrew its kingdom.
In John's day the actual city of Babylon lay in ruins. But because of the special role Babylon had played in oppressing His people in Old Testament times, God used the symbol of Babylon to show John how Satan would try to destroy His people near the close of history through a corrupt church (see Revelation 17).
As ancient Babylon rejected God, so much of the professed Christians world is rejecting Him today, if not in name, certainly in their actions. Those who reject the first angel's message can only fall lower and lower. According to the second angel, when the churches of Christendom will unite themselves fully with the world, then the fall of Babylon will be complete.
Then God's people will sound the second angel's message with great power (see Revelation 18:1-3). The undiscerning will fail to recognize Babylon's fall, seeing the union of church and state something good. but those who have entered into the holy place of the heavenly sanctuary will realize the nature of sin in the light of the cross, and they will speak out with great power against the corruption of Babylon.
In particular they will expose Babylon's erroneous teachings, her "wine" that she induces all nations to drink. Among other things, this wine includes the teaching that Sunday is sacred and that man has immortal soul by nature. The first error forms a bond between Roman Catholicism and Protestantism, and the second connects both with spiritualism.
The concept of the immortality of the soul is completely antagonistic to the Bible teaching that God alone has immortality and man may receive eternal life only by receiving Jesus Christ (1 Timothy 6:15,16; 2 Timothy 1:10). Satan deceived Eve by telling her, "Ye shall not surely die" (see Genesis 3:1-4 and compare Eccleasiastes 9:5; Romans 6:23; Malachi 4:1). And in the final conflict many who refuse to trust in the Word of God will fall for the same deception.
The
Interpretation of the Third Angel's Message:The third of the three final messages as a direct result of the first two and presents the full and final revelation of Jesus Christ, His perfect justice and mercy. When this message has polarized humanity, opportunity for salvation will close, the plagues of God's wrath will fall (Revelation 16), and Jesus will then come again to take His people back with Him to heaven.
The third angel presents a startling message, one designed to arouse men to the decisive issues at stake in the final conflict between Christ and Satan. It presents the most fearful warning ever sounded before mankind. The imagery it uses is based on Revelation 13. Whoever worships the beast(papal system) and his image (end-time union of church and state in America) and receives the beast's mark (the sign of his ecclesiastical authority - Sunday) while understandingly rejecting the Sabbath (the seal of God's authority) must "drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture."
So important is this warning that nearly the whole next section of the Book of Revelation is devoted to explaining it. According to Revelation 15:1, God will send His wrath upon those who support the beast. This will be in the form of seven great devastating plagues that will come unmixed with mercy, for those who reject the three angel's messages will clearly align themselves against Jesus Christ, so that He will no longer be able to cover them with His mercy.
The third angel ends his message with the words: "Here is the patience of the saints: here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus."
In these few words the third angel summarizes the everlasting gospel in the light of the judgment. The "saints", or holy ones, in the final crisis will be those who have placed their complete faith in (as the original Greek may read) Jesus and His perfect righteousness. In response to their patient endurance He will send the fullness of His Spirit to finish the work of grace in their lives and seal His law in their hearts (see James 5:7; Hosea 6:3; Hebrews 8:10-12). Thus God will seal His people through the third angel's message.
Those who receive this message in its fullness will over come the beast and his image, and Christ will deliver them from the murderous intentions of Satan (see Revelation 15:2; 12:17).
The final verses of Revelation 14 present two harvests, that of the wheat (verses 14-16) and that of the "vine of the earth" (verses 17-20). The prophet Joel who saw a similar scene, declared, "Put ye in the sickle, for the harvest is ripe: come, get you down; for the press is full, the fats over flow; for their wickedness is great" (Joel 3:13)