Interesting Facts Concerning Babylon’s Fall by George I. Butler

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Mar 25, 1909

Interesting Facts Concerning Babylon’s Fall

By George I. Butler

GEORGE I. BUTLER

The fall of Babylon was announced by fifty thousand earnest believers in Christ’s soon coming. This message was given in consequence of a great spiritual declension in the churches, and this declension has become more and more apparent as the years have gone by.

The careful and observing reader of The Revelation will notice that in each instance where the fall of Babylon is mentioned, there is a repetition. In the second angel’s message (Rev. 14:8) we read: “And there followed another angel, saying, Babylon is fallen, is fallen,” etc. In Rev. 18:1-4, the subject of Babylon’s great and final apostasy is more fully stated. “And after these things I saw another angel come down from heaven, having great power; and the earth was lightened with his glory. And he cried mightily with a strong voice, saying, Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and is become the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird. . . . 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. For her sins have reached unto heaven, and God hath remembered her iniquities.” Then the revelator proceeds to describe her complete destruction. Let the interested reader notice this point distinctly: the fall of Babylon and the destruction of Babylon are two distinct events. The destruction comes as a consequence of her fall. Her fall is a declension, or apostasy, because of the rejection of light. Instead of being the pure and faithful spouse of Christ, she becomes the worldly, proud, haughty mistress of the rulers and great men of the earth; in other words, church and state, politics and religion, are blended into one system. God holds such a union in abhorrence; but it is rapidly forming.

The second angel’s message, announcing the fall of Babylon, is not said to be proclaimed with a great and loud cry; but both the first and the third angel’s messages are said to be thus proclaimed; while of the proclamation contained in Revelation 18, already quoted, this is said most emphatically and most impressively. The angel is represented as “having great power,” and the effect of his proclamation is that the whole earth is “lightened with his glory.” He cried mightily, with a strong voice: “Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen;” and then is brought to view the awful effects of her fall,—she “is become the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit, and the cage of every unclean and hateful bird.” She “is become” such; as much as to say she was not always such. The process of her fall and apostasy was gradual, at times perhaps almost imperceptible; yet it was going steadily on, developing before the world, and especially before the student of prophecy, till at last the fruits of evil became so fully ripened that all candid believers of the Bible could plainly see her condition, which is then proclaimed with mighty power, and the solemn, awful command goes forth, “Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues.”

Much of this was not proclaimed in the first announcement in the second angel’s message. It would not have been true at that period when spiritual Babylon first rejected light. That first evil step led away from God’s truth. “Walk while ye have the light, lest darkness come upon you: for he that walketh in darkness knoweth not whither he goeth.” Walking is a movement indicating progress.

There occurred an important change in the attitude of the popular churches when they rejected the sure word of prophecy, which the apostle Peter says is a light in a dark place till the day shall dawn. When that light is rejected by the church, she must of necessity walk henceforth in great moral darkness. From that point when the first announcement was made, “Babylon is fallen,” great changes for the worse have been going on. Preceding that time, many noble Protestant teachers and leaders were earnest students of prophecy, and expositors of grand prophetic truths. Martin Luther and his leading associates of the great Protestant Reformation were familiar with the prophecies concerning the papal church and its awful work of apostasy and persecution. Luther, looking forward from his time, thought the Lord would come in about three hundred years. Three centuries after Luther’s day, multitudes of devoted followers of Jesus, in studying the same scriptures that Luther studied, reached the same conclusions he had reached, and publicly proclaimed the same great facts. If Luther had lived in our day, he would have been an Adventist.

In the grand Methodist revival, led by John Wesley, Adam Clarke, and many other devoted men, prophecy was highly prized and much studied. In some particulars their views were incorrect, yet it is a fact that much important light on the prophecies was brought out from the sacred page by them. John Wesley looked forward to about 1836 for the coming of the Lord, to about the time when William Miller began to proclaim the soon coming of the Saviour in the clouds of heaven.

We cite these well-known facts to make manifest the great change of attitude on the part of these modern churches, which took place about 1844, when, because of persecution, some fifty thousand Adventists were obliged to leave their communions. The popular churches turned their backs upon these great and glorious truths. What was their reason for so doing? They rejected most important Bible truths, and as the result, darkness came upon them, and they have become proud, worldly, fashionable churches, “lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God.” The apostle says, “From such turn away.”

The process of spiritual declension from this interesting point when the first announcement of Babylon’s moral fall was made, has been rapid and conspicuous. So plain are the evidences of this, that the careful student of prophecy is forced to the conclusion that we are rapidly nearing the time when the mighty angel of Revelation 18 will join the second angel of Rev. 14:8, and the loud cry, “Come out of her, my people,” will go forth. This point can not be far away. This last and mighty movement is but the completion of the message of the second angel’s work of chapter 14:8. They are similar in nature and character. One goes forth at the beginning of the process of unbelief and apostasy; the other sums up the final completion of it, and powerfully announces the terrible result. Then Christ comes, and great Babylon receives her final doom.

Soon after the disappointment in 1844, and the time when the Adventist believers were really forced out of the popular churches, many realized that a great change had occurred in those churches. Spiritual coldness prevailed, and many confessed it in great alarm. They themselves in a degree realized that a change for the worse had occurred. Many publicly confessed this fact. The trend of the current downward toward worldly standards has since become most noticeable. In the purer days, most of the churches had strict rules of living, to which it was expected their members would conform. In these rules of living were defined duties which were in harmony with Bible requirements. Fashionable clothing, the wearing of jewelry, attendance at card parties and theaters, were prohibited as works of the flesh and the carnal mind. Attendance at meetings, supporting the cause of God, taking part in religious services, etc., were expected of the members. These provisions long ago became a dead letter in the popular churches. Church-members now take the lead in the wearing of fashionable clothing, jewelry, etc., and many attend card parties and theaters, and find enjoyment in worldly pleasures. And so common have these practises become that they are scarcely noticed. The members of several leading churches once renowned for their humble piety, plainness in dress, obedience in discipline,

are now among the foremost of pleasure-seekers.

The methods of raising funds to help forward the gospel work has become, in many instances, a disgrace to the cause of God. Lotteries, grab-bags, big suppers, gambling, and various other devices, have been in vogue till even magistrates have referred to them as disgraceful. It is painful to refer to such matters; and though vastly more might be said, we forbear, with the passing remark that these customs are an indubitable evidence of backsliding, and a certain indication of a great moral fall in the leading churches of the Protestant world throughout Christendom.

Bowling Green, Fla.

(To be concluded)