REVELATION 9:12-15
by Mako Kato
Read Revelation 9:12-15.
Here we read about the 6th trumpet and the second woe. John heard a voice before the golden altar. Remember from earlier in Revelation that the golden altar is where the saints offered up their prayers (Revelation 8:3-4). This woe is part of the answers to prayers for judgment.
The 6th angel released the four angels bound at the river Euphrates. It is interesting that these angels are kept at Euphrates. The river Euphrates was at the edge of the territory promised to Abraham in Genesis 15:18. It was also the Eastern border of the Roman Empire. So the incoming judgment is coming from a symbolic and significant historical place.
And what a terrible event – A third of mankind killed. But something that is impressed upon me is the emphasis placed on the timing. The four angels had been prepared for “the hour, the day, the month and the year.” (Rev. 9:15 ESV).
This isn’t mindless destruction. This is all part of God’s plan and it has been part of God’s plan for a very long time. He knows when these different events are happening. He knows when the people of this world deserve to be judged in such a serious way. God is a holy and just God, but he is also a God of love.
Even as we read of the destruction of a third of the human race, we can put our trust in God’s plan and that it ultimately is good. God knows when the time will be for the world to be judged, just as we read in the New Testament how God judged Sodom and Gomorrah. We may have questions about why it has to be this way, like Abraham did. He wanted to know if God would spare Sodom if there were fifty righteous, or thirty or twenty or ten, and each time God said he would spare the city if there were that many righteous people… but there weren’t. God had His plan and kept to His plan. He knew best.
God’s knows the exact moment when he will unleash this second woe as part of His plan, but thank God that as part of His plan for this world He sent His only son to die for us. We didn’t deserve it and it doesn’t make sense, but His plan is beyond our understanding, just like it was beyond Abraham’s.
