The Seven Last Plagues Fall on the EarthBible World
16:4Revelation 16:4
And the third angel poured out his vial upon the rivers and fountains of waters; and they became blood.
The third of the seven last plagues turns the rivers and fountains of waters into blood. It is poured out after Christ finishes His priestly intercession, lays aside His priestly attire for garments of vengeance, and mercy leaves the world, and it cannot come until the sealing is done and those sealed are sheltered in Christ. It gives blood to drink to those who shed the blood of saints and prophets and condemned God's people to death, vindicating God's justice when guilt has exceeded the bounds of His grace as wrath without mercy. It falls on the godless world that worships the beast and its image and receives its mark, transgressing God's law and trampling His Sabbath, bringing fearful suffering that enrages them against the righteous whom they blame for the judgments. Its account must be closely and prayerfully studied and obeyed so as not to receive the plagues, for many are still unready and now is the time to get ready, receive the Holy Spirit, and be sanctified through the truth, while drops from the vials already fall in fires, earthquakes, floods, pestilence, and disasters as signs that the full outpouring is soon to come.
Place in Final Judgments
The third vial poured upon the rivers and fountains of waters, turning them to blood, is the third of the seven last plagues. Those seven last plagues fall upon those without shelter, upon the ungodly. They belong to the pre-Advent period of trouble.
They are the vials of God's wrath poured out in the day of His wrath and of the Lamb upon the living wicked. They come after Christ finishes His priestly intercession in the most holy place, finishes His work in the sanctuary and completes the cases of all people. Then He lays aside His priestly attire and garments, puts on the garments of vengeance to repay His adversaries, and steps out from between the Father and man. Then mercy leaves the world and the angel of mercy leaves it, and God keeps silent no longer toward those who have rejected His truth. When He begins to punish there will be no period of respite until the end.
They cannot come until Michael stands up and the time of trouble such as never was begins. For now the nations are only becoming angry and getting angry. The four angels still hold the four winds until the sanctuary work is done and until the sealing and the deciding of every case are done. After God seals His people a covering is drawn over the sealed to shelter them from the wrath poured out in the plagues. Only those sanctified through the truth are then covered and sheltered and hid with Christ in God until the desolation is overpast.
The plagues fall on the wicked just before and during the deliverance of God's people, as the plagues of Egypt fell before and at Israel's deliverance from bondage. They precede the final deliverance and are more terrible and extensive than those upon Egypt. Before they are poured out honest believers are called from the fallen churches, and ministers and people leave those churches to join the remnant.
The full outpouring is still near-future and soon to come. Vial after vial is to be poured out one after another upon the inhabitants of the earth, with trumpet after trumpet sounded, as solemn final events and scenes of stupendous interest right upon us before Christ's return. That time is the time of the battle of Armageddon, when all the world will be on one side or the other, when evil angels unite their powers with evil men in constant conflict strengthened for centuries and will not yield the last great final contest without a desperate struggle. Then Christ who has directed in every aggressive movement and accompanied the march of His cause through all the ages directs His cause and battle at the head of the angels of heaven, vindicates His truth and causes it to triumph, and supplies His faithful ones with motive and power of purpose, hope and courage and valor in increased activity. These judgments on the living wicked are not the final execution of judgment, for that comes at the second death.
Drops and sprinklings from the vials are already falling upon land and sea and affecting the elements of the air as faint previews and limited sprinklings of greater events in the near future. They include awful calamities by sea with vessels hurled into eternity without a moment's warning, and accidents by land with fire consuming riches men have hoarded and sweeping away the most costly structures as if by a breath of fire from heaven. They include the disasters of 1889 by sea and by land, unusually destructive fires, earthquakes burying cities and villages with their inhabitants, terrible railway accidents, tornadoes and floods destroying property including the Johnstown and Williamsport floods with more than two thousand lives lost, and similar disasters in other countries, with greater mortality, crimes, weeping and woe expected in 1890. God has not restrained the powers of darkness from carrying forward their deadly work of vitiating the air, one of the sources of life and nutrition, with deadly miasma, so that vegetable life is affected and man suffers pestilence, cholera and unexplainable diseases, and diphtheria gathering its harvest of precious little ones. They include pestilences, destructive fires, earthquakes, floods and other calamities upon the land, sea and air. They include pestilence, famine and death to come upon the inhabitants of the earth as a sign of Christ's coming, when the end of all things is at hand. When fully poured, earthquakes, premonitory convulsions, terrible shocks, the renting of the earth's crust and the outburst of elements concealed in the bowels of the earth will sweep away treasures and lordly palaces into heaps of ruins and terribly shake the religious world. These limited judgments give warning how fast the last crisis approaches and will wither people of every rank, rich and poor alike.
Righteous Retribution for Blood
The turning of rivers and fountains to blood gives the persecutors blood to drink as a measured recompense. It answers their decree condemning God's people to death and their shedding of the blood of saints and prophets. By that persecution they are counted guilty of that blood and declared worthy of this judgment.
This stroke vindicates God's justice and honor after long forbearance toward a godless world. It comes when human wickedness, war, bloodshed, rebellion, and contempt for His law have exceeded the bounds He prescribed and outrun the limits of His grace. Then Omnipotence reckons the sum of guiltiness of every nation, when His holy law is made void and trampled underfoot. Unlike earlier judgments tempered by mercy, this belongs to wrath without mercy, and once punishment begins there is no period of respite until the end.
The plagues fall on those without shelter and covering, on the ungodly and defiled world. They fall on those who worship the beast and its image and receive its mark. They fall on those who transgress His law, break His covenant, and trample upon His Sabbath while accepting a spurious rest day in its place, and the Lord will not interfere to protect their property.
Upon the wicked they bring fearful suffering. That suffering enrages them against the righteous, whom they blame for bringing the judgments and think to remove from the earth in order to stay them. In that rage they blame their families and their ministers, and the ministers suffer even more severely than the people. Judgment continues upon false shepherds and hireling priests who led their flock to death, until God's purposes are fulfilled and all the unrighteous are destroyed. At last those priests acknowledge that God loved the saints because they held fast the truth and kept His commandments.
Warning and Call to Readiness
God permits these judgments to fall in order to bring professing Christians to their senses, to awaken the world, to warn people to take heed, and to make sinners afraid and tremble before Him as proof that the end of all things is at hand. They come as awful calamities by sea and accidents by land, with vessels hurled into eternity without a moment's warning and with fire consuming riches men have hoarded, much of it accumulated by oppression of the poor. The most costly structures are swept away as if by a breath of fire from heaven, while the Lord does not interfere to protect the property of those who transgress His law, break His covenant, and trample upon His Sabbath by accepting a spurious rest day in its place.
The account of the plagues is symbolic and prophetic and must be closely and prayerfully studied rather than interpreted by human ideas. Its deeper truths become clearer through faith and practical obedience, and understanding the symbols is necessary to shape one's actions so as not to receive the coming plagues. That understanding calls for searching Scripture and obeying God's law, including the Sabbath, since the plagues fall on those without shelter.
Many of God's own people are unready and come up to that time without a shelter, and when the plagues begin to fall the unready will wring their hands because the hour is too late. Now is the time to get ready and to receive the Holy Spirit, with grace as wise virgins having oil in vessels with lamps, which is grace and the power of the Holy Ghost sustained by the power of God. Only those sanctified through the truth in the love of God will stand, hid with Christ in God until the desolation is overpast, through faithful stewardship of every trust of time, ability, opportunity, God's Word and Holy Spirit, and means consecrated to soul-saving and fruit in every good and noble work, rather than neglecting eternal interests for earthly things. Vial after vial is to be poured out one after another with trumpet after trumpet sounded as solemn events yet to transpire, in the time of the battle of Armageddon when all the world will be on one side or the other and the Captain of the Lord's host stands at the head of the angels of heaven to direct the battle, so that day must find none sleeping but wide awake in increased activity, hope, courage and valor.
Those who cannot recognize and see the signs of the times in this wicked and adulterous generation will perish under these plagues poured from the vials of God's wrath. Those who claim that the judgments of God now being sent upon the earth have no special meaning will soon be forced to understand what they now choose not to understand, for with the rest of Revelation 16:1-21 they show how fast the last great crisis is approaching and call for less time in strife and contention and more thought about that crisis. Sin, shame, sorrow and darkness are on every side, yet God still holds out the precious privilege of exchanging darkness for light, error for truth, and sin for righteousness. His patience and mercy will not always wait, and when He begins to punish transgressors there will be no period of respite until the end.
The third of the seven last plagues turns the rivers and fountains of waters into blood. It is poured out after Christ finishes His priestly intercession, lays aside His priestly attire for garments of vengeance, and mercy leaves the world, and it cannot come until the sealing is done and those sealed are sheltered in Christ. It gives blood to drink to those who shed the blood of saints and prophets and condemned God's people to death, vindicating God's justice when guilt has exceeded the bounds of His grace as wrath without mercy. It falls on the godless world that worships the beast and its image and receives its mark, transgressing God's law and trampling His Sabbath, bringing fearful suffering that enrages them against the righteous whom they blame for the judgments. Its account must be closely and prayerfully studied and obeyed so as not to receive the plagues, for many are still unready and now is the time to get ready, receive the Holy Spirit, and be sanctified through the truth, while drops from the vials already fall in fires, earthquakes, floods, pestilence, and disasters as signs that the full outpouring is soon to come.
Place in Final Judgments
The third vial poured upon the rivers and fountains of waters, turning them to blood, is the third of the seven last plagues. Those seven last plagues fall upon those without shelter, upon the ungodly. They belong to the pre-Advent period of trouble.
They are the vials of God's wrath poured out in the day of His wrath and of the Lamb upon the living wicked. They come after Christ finishes His priestly intercession in the most holy place, finishes His work in the sanctuary and completes the cases of all people. Then He lays aside His priestly attire and garments, puts on the garments of vengeance to repay His adversaries, and steps out from between the Father and man. Then mercy leaves the world and the angel of mercy leaves it, and God keeps silent no longer toward those who have rejected His truth. When He begins to punish there will be no period of respite until the end.
They cannot come until Michael stands up and the time of trouble such as never was begins. For now the nations are only becoming angry and getting angry. The four angels still hold the four winds until the sanctuary work is done and until the sealing and the deciding of every case are done. After God seals His people a covering is drawn over the sealed to shelter them from the wrath poured out in the plagues. Only those sanctified through the truth are then covered and sheltered and hid with Christ in God until the desolation is overpast.
The plagues fall on the wicked just before and during the deliverance of God's people, as the plagues of Egypt fell before and at Israel's deliverance from bondage. They precede the final deliverance and are more terrible and extensive than those upon Egypt. Before they are poured out honest believers are called from the fallen churches, and ministers and people leave those churches to join the remnant.
The full outpouring is still near-future and soon to come. Vial after vial is to be poured out one after another upon the inhabitants of the earth, with trumpet after trumpet sounded, as solemn final events and scenes of stupendous interest right upon us before Christ's return. That time is the time of the battle of Armageddon, when all the world will be on one side or the other, when evil angels unite their powers with evil men in constant conflict strengthened for centuries and will not yield the last great final contest without a desperate struggle. Then Christ who has directed in every aggressive movement and accompanied the march of His cause through all the ages directs His cause and battle at the head of the angels of heaven, vindicates His truth and causes it to triumph, and supplies His faithful ones with motive and power of purpose, hope and courage and valor in increased activity. These judgments on the living wicked are not the final execution of judgment, for that comes at the second death.
Drops and sprinklings from the vials are already falling upon land and sea and affecting the elements of the air as faint previews and limited sprinklings of greater events in the near future. They include awful calamities by sea with vessels hurled into eternity without a moment's warning, and accidents by land with fire consuming riches men have hoarded and sweeping away the most costly structures as if by a breath of fire from heaven. They include the disasters of 1889 by sea and by land, unusually destructive fires, earthquakes burying cities and villages with their inhabitants, terrible railway accidents, tornadoes and floods destroying property including the Johnstown and Williamsport floods with more than two thousand lives lost, and similar disasters in other countries, with greater mortality, crimes, weeping and woe expected in 1890. God has not restrained the powers of darkness from carrying forward their deadly work of vitiating the air, one of the sources of life and nutrition, with deadly miasma, so that vegetable life is affected and man suffers pestilence, cholera and unexplainable diseases, and diphtheria gathering its harvest of precious little ones. They include pestilences, destructive fires, earthquakes, floods and other calamities upon the land, sea and air. They include pestilence, famine and death to come upon the inhabitants of the earth as a sign of Christ's coming, when the end of all things is at hand. When fully poured, earthquakes, premonitory convulsions, terrible shocks, the renting of the earth's crust and the outburst of elements concealed in the bowels of the earth will sweep away treasures and lordly palaces into heaps of ruins and terribly shake the religious world. These limited judgments give warning how fast the last crisis approaches and will wither people of every rank, rich and poor alike.
Righteous Retribution for Blood
The turning of rivers and fountains to blood gives the persecutors blood to drink as a measured recompense. It answers their decree condemning God's people to death and their shedding of the blood of saints and prophets. By that persecution they are counted guilty of that blood and declared worthy of this judgment.
This stroke vindicates God's justice and honor after long forbearance toward a godless world. It comes when human wickedness, war, bloodshed, rebellion, and contempt for His law have exceeded the bounds He prescribed and outrun the limits of His grace. Then Omnipotence reckons the sum of guiltiness of every nation, when His holy law is made void and trampled underfoot. Unlike earlier judgments tempered by mercy, this belongs to wrath without mercy, and once punishment begins there is no period of respite until the end.
The plagues fall on those without shelter and covering, on the ungodly and defiled world. They fall on those who worship the beast and its image and receive its mark. They fall on those who transgress His law, break His covenant, and trample upon His Sabbath while accepting a spurious rest day in its place, and the Lord will not interfere to protect their property.
Upon the wicked they bring fearful suffering. That suffering enrages them against the righteous, whom they blame for bringing the judgments and think to remove from the earth in order to stay them. In that rage they blame their families and their ministers, and the ministers suffer even more severely than the people. Judgment continues upon false shepherds and hireling priests who led their flock to death, until God's purposes are fulfilled and all the unrighteous are destroyed. At last those priests acknowledge that God loved the saints because they held fast the truth and kept His commandments.
Warning and Call to Readiness
God permits these judgments to fall in order to bring professing Christians to their senses, to awaken the world, to warn people to take heed, and to make sinners afraid and tremble before Him as proof that the end of all things is at hand. They come as awful calamities by sea and accidents by land, with vessels hurled into eternity without a moment's warning and with fire consuming riches men have hoarded, much of it accumulated by oppression of the poor. The most costly structures are swept away as if by a breath of fire from heaven, while the Lord does not interfere to protect the property of those who transgress His law, break His covenant, and trample upon His Sabbath by accepting a spurious rest day in its place.
The account of the plagues is symbolic and prophetic and must be closely and prayerfully studied rather than interpreted by human ideas. Its deeper truths become clearer through faith and practical obedience, and understanding the symbols is necessary to shape one's actions so as not to receive the coming plagues. That understanding calls for searching Scripture and obeying God's law, including the Sabbath, since the plagues fall on those without shelter.
Many of God's own people are unready and come up to that time without a shelter, and when the plagues begin to fall the unready will wring their hands because the hour is too late. Now is the time to get ready and to receive the Holy Spirit, with grace as wise virgins having oil in vessels with lamps, which is grace and the power of the Holy Ghost sustained by the power of God. Only those sanctified through the truth in the love of God will stand, hid with Christ in God until the desolation is overpast, through faithful stewardship of every trust of time, ability, opportunity, God's Word and Holy Spirit, and means consecrated to soul-saving and fruit in every good and noble work, rather than neglecting eternal interests for earthly things. Vial after vial is to be poured out one after another with trumpet after trumpet sounded as solemn events yet to transpire, in the time of the battle of Armageddon when all the world will be on one side or the other and the Captain of the Lord's host stands at the head of the angels of heaven to direct the battle, so that day must find none sleeping but wide awake in increased activity, hope, courage and valor.
Those who cannot recognize and see the signs of the times in this wicked and adulterous generation will perish under these plagues poured from the vials of God's wrath. Those who claim that the judgments of God now being sent upon the earth have no special meaning will soon be forced to understand what they now choose not to understand, for with the rest of Revelation 16:1-21 they show how fast the last great crisis is approaching and call for less time in strife and contention and more thought about that crisis. Sin, shame, sorrow and darkness are on every side, yet God still holds out the precious privilege of exchanging darkness for light, error for truth, and sin for righteousness. His patience and mercy will not always wait, and when He begins to punish transgressors there will be no period of respite until the end.