March 18, 2006
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Revelation 9:1-12 The fifth trumpet. I am praying that all who are on the earth are up in Heaven before this time, because now the judgements are intensifying.
When the fifth angel sounds, John sees a star that has fallen from heaven to the earth, and he (the star) is given a key to the bottomless pit. Who is this star? It is lucifer – known as the day star and the shining one. We can read about his fall in Isaiah 14:12-17 where it talks about the fall of lucifer, who weakened the nations. Lucifer said in his heart that he would exalt his throne above God, and be like the Most High. But he will be brought down to Sheol, to the lowest depths of the Pit.
Ezekiel 28 gives further information from verse 11-19 It talks about the perfection of his (lucifer’s) body, the timbrels and pipes prepared from the day lucifer was created. He was an anointed cherub and was on the holy mountain of God. He was perfect until iniquity found him out. He became filled with violence, sinned, and was cast out. his heart was lifted up because of his beauty, so he was cast down to the ground. And now defiles sanctuaries. And God will turn him into ashes, and all who knew them would be astonished. This is a lamentation for the king of Tyre, but also speaks of Lucifer.
Now lucifer is given the key to the bottomless pit the abuso (abyss) and when it is opened smoke comes out of the pit like the smoke of a great furnace. The sun and air are darkened, and locusts come on the earth. These are not ordinary locusts, for they have the power of scorpions, they do not harm the grass or any green thing like earthly locusts do. They are also not allowed to harm those who have the seal of God on their foreheads (that is the 144,000 who were marked in Chapter 7). These supernatural locusts could not kill men, they were to torment them for five months, and it would be a torment of a scorpion when it strikes a man.
This torment will be so horrific that men will seek death but will not be able to find it.
Listen to their description: Verses 7-11The shape of the locusts was like horses prepared for battle. On their heads were crowns of something like gold, and their faces were like the faces of men. They had hair like women’s hair, and their teeth were like lion’s teeth. And they had breastplates like breastplates of iron, and the sound of their wings was like the sound of chariots with many horses running into battle. They had tails like scorpions, and there were stings in their tails. Their power was to hurt men five months. And they had as king over them the angel of the bottomless pit, whose name in Hebrew is Abaddon, but in Greek he has the name Apollyon.
At some point we will talk about the day of the Lord, in which God’s Spirit is poured out on a sin-filled earth. Some of the signs of the day of the Lord include blood and fire, pillars of smoke. The moon turned into blood. This is mentioned in the later half of Joel 2. We have seen the moon turn into blood with the sixth seal, fire has come down from heaven. Now we see smoke filling the air when the bottomless pit is opened. These are indicative of the Day of the Lord. God also talks about restoring what the locusts ate in Verses 25-27 of Joel 2, where God ends with “Then you shall know that I am in the midst of Israel; I am the Lord your God and there is no other. My people shall never be put to shame. And it shall come to pass afterward that I will pour out My Spirit on all flesh; Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, Your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions, and also on My menservants and on my Maidservants, I will pour out my Spirit in those days. (This has not happened to Israel yet – remember that the believers who had the Holy Spirit are now in Heaven since Chapters 4 & 5 of Revelation)
One aside – here is a verse that must give grief to those who feel that females have no place in the ministry. For here the women will prophesy and God will pour his spirit not only on men but also on women.
But God will move in a dramatic way in these last days. His hope with the judgements is not cruelty, but a wake-up call that is unmistakable. Remember these are words of prophesy and this book (The Bible) is in print. Anyone who is willing to read honestly these words will be able to figure out what is happening, and the choice that they have to make. I heard that one person has put into Petra Bibles in Hebrew so that when people flee there they will be able to read exactly what is happening, and hopefully they will turn to Christ. (It is speculated that the Israelites may flee to Petra, I will share more of that later)
In Luke 8 when Jesus healed the demon possessed man verse 31: And they begged Him that He would not command them to go out into the abyss. If demons do not want to go there it must be a horrific place to be, and it is from this abyss that these unnatural locusts emerge.
Another verse about this place that the locusts come from.
2 Peter 2:4 For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but cast them down to hell and delivered them into chains of darkness to be reserved for judgement..
Remember one of the Plagues of Moses was locusts on the land, and these locusts did not touch the crops of the Israelites, just those of Pharaoh. Here the locusts do not touch the crop of God (the 144,000), just those who are on the earth. No one except the 144,000 are free from the pain that these locusts inflict.
The locusts are not natural, locusts eat grass, and here they do not. Just their appearance is frightening, The hair of a woman, seductive, the lion is insatiable, their hearts are covered with iron breastplates – cold hearts.
Proverbs 30 speaks of the locust in verse 27 – when they talk about four things which are little on the earth. Locusts have no king, yet they all advance in ranks.”
Yet, these locusts do have a king – Abaddon, Apollyon. Abaddon means to perish. This name occurs six times in the Hebrew Bible. King James and NIV translate Abaddon as destruction. It often appears parallel with Sheol and Death. (Holman Bible Dictionary)
God does not want anyone to perish. The purpose of the locusts is to draw people to repentance. And in this case the people want to die but they cannot. God will not give them a release from this torment, not wanting any to perish. The people think they have control over their lives and death, and here they will find out that they cannot cause themselves to die.
They will (speculation) probably wonder why the 144,000 are not being harmed by the locusts, and I would assume that the 144,000 will be preaching about repentance.
Notice that the angel after the 4th trumpet spoke of Woe, Woe, Woe, because of the remaining blasts of the trumpets.
This is the first woe, and after the five months of the locusts the first woe is past and two more woes are coming AFTER THESE THINGS (another time phrase that indicates the sequential nature of these judgements).
I pray that we reach many with Jesus’ Gospel so that there are not many on earth who have to undergo these judgements.
Please have a blessed Saturday.
Heather
Comments (7)
Heather, I have a personal question to ask about your view on women ministering in the church. I have had to take this to the Lord several different times over the last 12 years and according to some different circumstances felt the Lord lead me in a couple of different ways. At one point, I was teaching a coed Sunday School class for my pastor who was dying of cancer and none of the elders or deacons in the class would take the class for him, so he asked me because I was one of the few in class who was excited enough to participate actively…God blessed that time and I grew as well as the class because I made them participate! I prayed for several weeks about it before I agreed to do it, and felt very at peace because there were no men who would step up and do this. The church where we are now however, has a very active and strong male leadership among it. I have co-taught with my husband adult classes, and I work alongside him as he ministers to the youth through college age, but I am of the opinion that when the men will lead–they should lead. I feel like the lack of male spiritual leadership is the majority of what is wrong with the Church today not to even begin to speak of the family…I feel that God will use whoever makes themselves avaliable to teach and preach if the men are not doing as they have been commanded, but that God’s perfect will would be that men would raise up and lead. Just wanted some feedback from you. Thanks! Hope your daughter’s surprise party was a blessing to her ~ Sherry
I have to tell you that I am not an expert, but I feel that there is no problem with a woman teaching in church. That being said there are many examples in the Bible, Deborah, the Woman at the Well, Lydia, etc. I think that when Paul was speaking on this topic He was speaking to a specific set of believers. That being said, I also think that having a covering of male leadership is also good, and when Pastor Don asked me to teach that Sunday, he also went over what I was going to teach to make sure it was Biblical (my request) and he is the Pastor of our church. But God will use women, and for that matter even donkeys to get his point across.
I also think that there are many good examples of women teachers today, Beth Moore, Kay Arthur, Joyce Meyer, to name a few and they teach, but also have a male covering as well. I think the result is the fruit of what they are teaching, and they produce a lot of good fruit for the Lord. So I think that we have to look on a case by case basis, and there is a lot of legalists out there who are worried about many things. In this day and age, as Revelation suggests, when the time grows short, the men and women will prophesy (which also implies teach and forthtell, not just foretell). I think that it is good to have a balance. For we are all the body of Christ.
Heather
Hey there, thanks for the comment. God’s blessing can come in many forms. Too often people get to thinking God can work in every which way except in finances. We need to get that thinking out of our heads and see that God has power over everything, and that there is nothing under the sun that God can’t do. Again, I thank you for your comment. I have seen God work many wonders in my finances to not believe or be discouraged by fellow christians who mean well. God bless, heather.
God can build things we can’t conceive in our limited minds.
Heather,
You started you comments about this section with the following: “I am praying that all who are on the earth are up in Heaven before this time, because now the judgements are intensifying.”
My question is: what do you belive in, a post-tribulation rapture, a mid-tribulation rapture, or a pre-tribulation rapture? If you’d like to reply you can go to my site and send me an email.
Sorry,
I must have missed those posts!
It appears that the earth is groaning for His return in so many ways, I pray so many will wake up.