Revelation 9 - The First Woe

Introduction

By April of A.D. 70, the siege of Jerusalem by the Roman General Titus had made the city into Hell on earth. The judgments that Jesus had prophesied in Matthew 24 were all coming upon the generation of Jews who had put Him to death—they had mockingly cried out that His blood be upon their heads and their children’s heads (Matt. 27:25), and now the curse they had called down upon themselves was coming true.

The bloody horseman of war had shut them up inside the city as thousands of Roman Legionnaires amassed outside the gates. The black horse of famine was causing massive starvation as various rebel Jewish factions destroyed each other’s food supplies, leading to at least one recorded case of a woman slaughtering and eating her own son while he nursed at her breast (Josephus, Wars, 6.3.4-5). The pale horseman of death clogged the streets of the city with corpses, forcing the rebels to throw them, unburied, over the wall under cover of night, until the ravines outside Jerusalem were piled with the rotting bodies of their friends and loved ones.

But even these horrors paled in comparison with the hideous evil that fell on the city in the final months before its fall, as the rebels utterly turned on their own people. As the eyewitness historian Josephus records:

With their insatiable hunger for loot, they ransacked the houses of the wealthy, murdered men and violated women for sport; they drank their spoils with blood, and from mere satiety and shamelessness gave themselves up to effeminate practices, [braiding] their hair and putting on women’s clothes, drenched themselves with perfumes and painting their eyelids to make themselves attractive. They copied not merely the dress, but also the passions of women, devising in their excess of licentiousness unlawful pleasures in which they wallowed, as if in a brothel. Thus they entirely polluted the city with their foul practices. Yet though they wore women’s faces their hands were murderous. They would approach with mincing steps, then suddenly become fighting men, and, whipping out their swords from under their dyed cloaks, they would run through every passerby. (Wars, 4.9.10)

This was no ordinary violence; this was violence carried out by beings who had almost entirely ceased to be human. They had refused to worship the Messiah and had instead put Him to death. And now the lust and greed and violence that they had worshipped for so long was possessing them with demonic intensity to destroy them.

And this is what we learn from Revelation 9 this morning—that

A people who will not worship Christ will be destroyed by what they will worship.

In Chapter 8 we saw the angels blow the first four of the seven trumpets signalling the coming judgment on Jerusalem. At the end of the chapter we read that John saw an eagle “crying with a loud voice as it flew directly overhead, ‘Woe, woe, woe to those who dwell on the earth, at the blasts of the other trumpets that the three angels are about to blow!” (Rev. 8:13). And in Chapter 9 we see the first of those “woes” fall on Jerusalem in the form of demonic oppression and destruction unleashed on the city.

A people who will not worship Christ will be destroyed by what they will worship. At the end of the chapter we learn that the people who suffered these woes were guilty of demon-worship. And here in these verses we see them tormented and destroyed by the same demons they worshipped.

When the fifth trumpet is blown, the people are

I. Tormented by imprisoned demons (Rev. 9:1-12)

Look at verses 1-6:

Revelation 9:1–6 ESV

And the fifth angel blew his trumpet, and I saw a star fallen from heaven to earth, and he was given the key to the shaft of the bottomless pit. He opened the shaft of the bottomless pit, and from the shaft rose smoke like the smoke of a great furnace, and the sun and the air were darkened with the smoke from the shaft. Then from the smoke came locusts on the earth, and they were given power like the power of scorpions of the earth. They were told not to harm the grass of the earth or any green plant or any tree, but only those people who do not have the seal of God on their foreheads. They were allowed to torment them for five months, but not to kill them, and their torment was like the torment of a scorpion when it stings someone. And in those days people will seek death and will not find it. They will long to die, but death will flee from them.

We know that these are not literal locusts, because they do not act like locusts—they ignore green trees, grass and plants, which are the only thing real locusts attack. (Also, they seem to have a “king”—which we just saw earlier in the year from Proverbs 30:27 that “locusts have no king...”!) The main reason that we understand these creatures to be demons is because of where they come from— “the bottomless pit” (Gk, Abyss). There is another reference to the “Abyss” in Luke 8, where Jesus drives a Legion of demons out of a man and into a herd of pigs because they had been begging Him “not to command them to depart into the Abyss” (Luke 8:31).

This is why we say that the people in Revelation 9 are being tormented by imprisoned demons—because whenever He cast out a demon in the Gospels,

Christ sent them into the Abyss (Luke 8:31)

Jesus spent three years travelling through the Land, casting out demons and commanding them to depart into the bottomless pit, the Abyss. But the generation that saw Him do that mighty work of spiritual warfare, cleaning out the demonic oppression they suffered, rejected Him as their Savior. And so as the fifth trumpet blows, He sends an angel to unlock the prison and re-release all of the demons He had delivered them from!

Jesus warned that this very thing would happen to that generation—in Matthew 12 we read

Matthew 12:43–45 ESV

“When the unclean spirit has gone out of a person, it passes through waterless places seeking rest, but finds none. Then it says, ‘I will return to my house from which I came.’ And when it comes, it finds the house empty, swept, and put in order. Then it goes and brings with it seven other spirits more evil than itself, and they enter and dwell there, and the last state of that person is worse than the first. So also will it be with this evil generation.”

For forty years, all the demons Jesus cast out of every victim as He ministered throughout Galilee, Judea and Samaria were imprisoned in the bottomless pit. And now, with the sounding of the fifth trumpet,

Christ released them on Jerusalem (Matt. 12:43-45)

And those demons that had for so long been trapped in the desolate barrenness of the Abyss came back and found Jerusalem the way Jesus had left it—swept clean of demonic activity—and so they descended on it with all the pent-up rage and hatred of their imprisonment, and the city was worse off than it was before Jesus cleansed it in the first place. All of this came upon that evil generation that rejected Christ, just as He said it would.

A people who will not worship Christ will be destroyed by what they will worship. Jerusalem rejected and murdered their Messiah, and so Jesus re-released upon that evil generation all the demons He had previously cast into the Abyss. But even here, in the horror of this judgment, we see some measure of mercy. In Revelation 9:4-5 we see that though He released those demons back on the city,

Christ limited them in their power (Rev. 9:4-5, 10)

The king of the demons, “Abaddon” in Hebrew and “Apollyon” in Greek, both mean “Destroyer”—but even the king of the demons was under the authority of Christ! They could “torment” but not kill. And they could only torment for the last five months of the siege of Jerusalem, from April to September of A.D. 70. As horrible as this judgment was, even here Christ says, “Thus far and no farther” to the demonic hordes that descended on the city. Even as that wicked generation was receiving every last drop of the wrath of the Lamb, yet there was a drop of mercy mingled with it—that they should not die, but that their suffering should drive them to repent and call on Him for forgiveness. Even though they wanted to die (v. 6), they would not. It was at the same time a miserable punishment—not even death could rescue them from their torment—and a glimpse of grace—even at this extremity, they could still call on God for repentance.

A people who will not worship Christ will be destroyed by what they will worship. The wicked generation that rejected Christ were tormented by imprisoned demons, and in verses 13-19 we see them

II. Destroyed by subdued demons (Rev. 9:13-19)

Look at verses 13-19:

Revelation 9:13–19 ESV

Then the sixth angel blew his trumpet, and I heard a voice from the four horns of the golden altar before God, saying to the sixth angel who had the trumpet, “Release the four angels who are bound at the great river Euphrates.” So the four angels, who had been prepared for the hour, the day, the month, and the year, were released to kill a third of mankind. The number of mounted troops was twice ten thousand times ten thousand; I heard their number. And this is how I saw the horses in my vision and those who rode them: they wore breastplates the color of fire and of sapphire and of sulfur, and the heads of the horses were like lions’ heads, and fire and smoke and sulfur came out of their mouths. By these three plagues a third of mankind was killed, by the fire and smoke and sulfur coming out of their mouths. For the power of the horses is in their mouths and in their tails, for their tails are like serpents with heads, and by means of them they wound.

Every enemy that had ever attacked Jerusalem had come from the east, over the Euphrates River—the Assyrians in 722 B.C., the Babylonians in 586 B.C., the Persians in 539 B.C., the Greeks in 332 B.C., and now the Romans in 70 A.D.—the Roman 10th Legion was stationed along the Euphrates according to Josephus, and in the final months of the siege they moved from there toward Jerusalem, and were one of the key forces involved in destroying the city.

Here in these verses, though, John describes the advance of the enemy as an advance of a demonic army—monstrous horse-like creatures with lion’s heads and serpents for tails, breathing out smoke and fire and sulphur to kill a third of the city. In verse 15 we see that

Christ set the timing of their destruction (Rev. 9:15)

Revelation 9:15 ESV

So the four angels, who had been prepared for the hour, the day, the month, and the year, were released to kill a third of mankind.

Here again we see that these demonic forces that drive the army to destroy are bounded by the authority of the Lamb. They could not move until the very hour of the very day of the very month of the very year that the Lamb had commanded—no matter how much they may have wanted to, they were powerless to act until His time had arrived.

This is because when Christ died on the Cross and rose again victorious from the grave, He publicly humiliated and subdued every demonic power in the universe—Colossians 2:15 says

Colossians 2:15 ESV

He disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame, by triumphing over them in him.

When a Roman general would return to Rome from conquering a people, he would always force the conquered king to march behind him in chains, stripped naked, and humiliated before the cheering crowds. When Jesus Christ arose from the grave, He did the same thing—He publicly humiliated and disarmed every demon, every principality and power, every devil, unclean spirit, every ghost, ghoul, shade, phantom, every evil spirit and dark terror that ever haunted this world.

But the wicked generation that rejected the conquering Messiah forfeited His victory over those demonic forces. Instead of worshiping Christ, they turned to worship the very demons that Christ had humiliated—and now those demonic hordes are being unleashed on them!

Not only did the Lamb set the timing of the city’s destruction, but

Christ set the scope of their destruction (Rev. 9:18)

Revelation 9:18 ESV

By these three plagues a third of mankind was killed, by the fire and smoke and sulfur coming out of their mouths.

The literal Greek rendering of verse 18 says that “By these three plagues one third of the men were killed...”, which is how it is translated in the King James—the ESV makes an interpretive decision here to render it as “mankind”, in keeping with an understanding that this event is in the far future some time. But if we take John’s timing as our starting point, that all these things were to happen “soon”, and Jesus’ repeated assertion that all these things would happen to “this generation”, then reading this word as “the men (of the city)” fits the context better than “all mankind on the face of the earth”. (But again—Bible-believing Christians can read this passage either way and still be in fellowship with each other!)

But whether you read this passage as an event far in the future or as fulfilled on the wicked generation that rejected the Messiah, either way you see that, once again, Christ is in utter control of the destruction they unleash. He says to the demonic forces driving the army, “This far and no farther—only one third of the people may die, two-thirds must be spared.” And those subdued demons must obey Him.

Think about that for a moment—Jesus Christ presented Himself to the people of Jerusalem—His own covenant people that He had set His love on for thousands of years. He came to them and revealed His power over every force of darkness and evil, casting out demons from every city, every synagogue, every place throughout Galilee, Samaria and Judea. He rescued them from the torment of demonic forces and announced to them “the year of the Lord’s favor”—that He had come to His people.

And they decided they would rather worship the demons He had conquered. Instead of falling at His feet as their Savior, they murdered Him as a criminal. Instead of hailing Him as the Messiah that they claimed to be waiting for, they tortured Him to death and mocked Him as He died. And for all of the horror of this chapter, for all of the hideous destruction and demonic torment and woe that the fifth and sixth trumpet unleashed, I think the most terrifying verses of all come at the end of the chapter. Because after all of the agony and torment that they have suffered, the people still

III. Choose demons over Christ (Rev. 9:20-21)

Look at verses 20-21:

Revelation 9:20–21 ESV

The rest of mankind, who were not killed by these plagues, did not repent of the works of their hands nor give up worshiping demons and idols of gold and silver and bronze and stone and wood, which cannot see or hear or walk, nor did they repent of their murders or their sorceries or their sexual immorality or their thefts.

The wrath of the Lamb is being poured out on them—the blasting trumpets announcing His judgment falling on them as they are tormented by the demons He had imprisoned and destroyed by the demons He had conquered. Even through all of that horror, Jesus left a glimmer of grace—that even now, if they would repent He would deliver them, but they would not.

As one commentator puts it:

We sometimes like to imagine that the damned in Hell would gladly repent, if only given the ghost of a chance. But yet we have a harbinger of Hell, a hell-on-earth, and though you might think that would be an inducement to repentance, it turns out that repentance is a gift of the sovereign God. There really is a mystery to lawlessness; it is a rebellion that makes no sense whatsoever. (Wilson, D. (2019). When the Man Comes Around: A Commentary on the Book of Revelation. Amsterdam University Press.)

Jesus Christ came to declare freedom from bondage to sin:

Romans 6:6 ESV

We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin.

But here we see that generation

Rejected Christ’s power over sin (v. 20)

They became like their idols—powerless. Verse 20 is a reference to Psalm 115, where the people who worship idols become just like them—deaf, dumb, blind and powerless. They could not hear His call to repent, they could not see His glory, they could not come to Him for salvation. A people who will not worship Christ will be destroyed by what they will worship. The sinners will not let their sin go, and the sin will not let the sinners go.

They rejected Christ’s power over sin, and in verse 21 they

Rejected Christ’s sacrifice for sin (v. 21)

Revelation 9:21 ESV

nor did they repent of their murders or their sorceries or their sexual immorality or their thefts.

Beloved, look around us on this Independence Day weekend, as we celebrate the birth of this nation 244 years ago. We are a nation that refuses to repent of the murder of 50 million innocent children—in fact, we are a nation that celebrates it, that glories in the innocent blood that stains our soil, with politicians telling us that our problem is we aren’t murdering enough babies, and there need to be even more abortions. (And where has all our fighting over “conservative” justices on the Supreme Court gotten us? We have been justly rewarded for trusting in nine unelected pikers in black robes to save us, instead of crying out in repentance to God to stem the tidal wave of babies’ blood that we spill every day in this nation.)

The word for “sorceries” here is the Greek word pharmakeia, where we get our English word “pharmacy”—it refers to the type of sorcery that involved mind-altering drugs—we live in a nation where each state governor is rushing to legalize drugs before their neighbor, saying that our problem is that we don’t have liberal enough policies to allow for more drugs.

We are a nation that has raised sexual immorality as the absolute highest virtue of our land—that perversions of the marriage bed and physical mutilation of children’s sex organs and sexual schizophrenia must be celebrated, promoted and glorified by every last citizen, by order (once again) of our wonderful “conservative majority” of the Supreme Court. We are a nation of people who govern our lives with hearts of theft—we riot in the streets for “justice” (which is really only a thinly-veiled expression of envy and hatred for others who have what we want)—because somehow our riots always seem to include running out of a looted Target store with a new plasma TV.

Beloved, a people who refuse to worship Christ —this people who refuse to worship Christ—will be destroyed by what they will worship. If you are here as a worshipper of Jesus Christ—if you bear the mark of the Lamb by your faith in the death, burial and resurrection of Christ your Savior, then you are free from the torment of those demonic forces (Rev. 9:4)—so how could you ever go back voluntarily to the greed and hatred and malice of sin? How could you ever go back and choose sin over Christ? How can you who died to sin still live in it?

See here the horror of a people who suffer the wrath of the Lamb for their rejection of His salvation—people who still choose their sin over His salvation—and commit yourself again to the holiness that He has purchased for you by His blood—the blood that seals your salvation in Him. Reckon yourself every day as crucified with Christ—that you no longer live, but Jesus Christ lives in you, and the life that you live in the flesh you live by faith in the Son of God who loved you and gave Himself for you!

And let this chapter on this Independence Day weekend compel you to pray for this nation that is in the midst of a full-throated rejection of Jesus Christ. The rebellion and hatred of our people for the reign of the Lamb has reached a fever-pitch that goes beyond anything in living memory. And so the message of the Scriptures for this nation today is: Repent in the Name of Jesus Christ! The stench of the filth of our wickedness has reached the Throne room of the Almighty, and there is nothing to stop the wrath of the Lamb from pouring out judgment to the last drop on this land.

The ash-heap of history is clogged with kingdoms and empires and nations that believed that they could never fall, that their influence and wealth and language and people would endure forever—and the United States of America is no different than any of them. The fact that we were founded as a “Christian” nation helps us not one bit—any more than a cheating husband can justify himself by pointing to his marriage certificate. The fact that we were founded as a Christian nation intensifies our damnation for our current rebellion.

A little country sermon by a little country preacher in a little country church has no chance of being heard by anyone that matters in the affairs of this country. But just as Ecclesiastes says that a bird can carry words spoken in private to the ears of the king, God is able to direct His word to those who need to hear it. So Google, Facebook, NSA, if you are listening to this sermon file and taking note of all of the “hate speech” in this sermon, at least hear this: Repent in the Name of Jesus Christ for the abominations of rebellion that this nation has heaped up before Almighty God, for the day of His wrath is coming, and you will not stand.

But even here is the glimmer of grace in the midst of the doom that approaches—here is the drop of mercy that is mingled with the coming judgment—that even now, if you repent, you can be delivered from the wrath of the Lamb. Do not cling to your idolatries—your bloodshed, your sorceries, your immoralities and thefts. Do not reject the worship of the Lamb—turn away from your sin, turn away from your rebellion against Him and call out for forgiveness on the basis of His blood shed on the Cross for you. Even now He is calling you, and he will welcome you with open arms. He will wash you clean from all your guilt and shame, He will crown you with victory over your sin and clothe you in the white robe of His righteousness. Don’t delay, don’t wait until tomorrow, don’t let another moment go by—but come, and welcome!—to Jesus Christ!

BENEDICTION

Jude 24–25 ESV

Now to him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you blameless before the presence of his glory with great joy, to the only God, our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion, and authority, before all time and now and forever. Amen.

QUESTIONS FOR REFLECTION:

What are some “idolatries” that people cling to—things that they would have to surrender if they were to repent and come to Christ? Is there an area of your life that you find it hard to “let go of” in order to walk as a Christian?

In what ways do we see Jesus Christ exercising authority over demonic forces in this chapter? Read Colossians 2:15 again. How does the fact that Christ has completely vanquished and disarmed all the demonic forces of this world give you peace in the midst of the upheaval and chaos of our times?

Spend time this week reading over Revelation 9. How does God speak to you through these verses as you pray for the United States of America? For Pennsylvania? For Sykesville? For your family and friends?