The First Two Islamic Woes in Revelation 8-11

Transcription

1 The First Two Islamic Woes in Revelation 8-11 Although it seems like Revelation is hard to understand, when we know much of it is about Islam it gives us a much clearer message. Revelation chapters 8-11 tell us about three major woes. Revelation is about a spiritual battle, not a physical battle. The three woes can be summarized this way: 1. The beginning of Islam is the first woe 2. The second woe is the worldwide spread Islam 3. The third woe is the final punishment for all those that do not accept Christ This article will focus on the first two woes described in Revelation chapters 8 to 11. It may surprise you to know that we are pretty far into the second woe. As the woes are introduced to us, a key message is repeated several times that a very important object falls or is hurled to earth. Although some may view this object falling in a literal sense, the best explanation is that the objects are symbolic of Satan, once removed from Heaven and returned back to earth, sometime after Christ s ascension. Licensed from Shutterstock

2 Revelation 8 (NIV) 7 The first angel sounded his trumpet, and there came hail and fire mixed with blood, and it was hurled down on the earth. A third of the earth was burned up, a third of the trees were burned up, and all the green grass was burned up. 8 The second angel sounded his trumpet, and something like a huge mountain, all ablaze, was thrown into the sea. A third of the sea turned into blood, 9 a third of the living creatures in the sea died, and a third of the ships were destroyed. 10 The third angel sounded his trumpet, and a great star, blazing like a torch, fell from the sky on a third of the rivers and on the springs of water 11 the name of the star is Wormwood. A third of the waters turned bitter, and many people died from the waters that had become bitter. 12 The fourth angel sounded his trumpet, and a third of the sun was struck, a third of the moon, and a third of the stars, so that a third of them turned dark. A third of the day was without light, and also a third of the night. 13 As I watched, I heard an eagle that was flying in midair call out in a loud voice: Woe! Woe! Woe to the inhabitants of the earth, because of the trumpet blasts about to be sounded by the other three angels! These verses mean Satan (blazing mountain, falling blazing star) and his angels (bloody hail) fell to earth and convinced Mohammad in 610 that Jesus Christ was not the Messiah. Shortly thereafter Mohammad and his warriors destroyed over 20,000 Christian churches representing about a third of all the churches in the world. That s what the third of everything being destroyed means. The third of stars turning dark means one third of angels fell with Satan. The polluted water turning bitter means when Islamic doctrine tells us Jesus is not the Son of God--this is false. The words "many people died from the waters that had become bitter" means the false Islamic doctrine killed their souls. Spiritual death is worse than physical death. Understanding the Hail of Revelation Hail is mentioned three times in Revelation. Hail is first described as mixed with fire and blood in Revelation 8, and the final hail is described as huge in size and weight (100 pounds). The second hail in Revelation 16 falls during the third Islamic woe on the remaining people on earth that had the mark of the beast, after the rapture. The large hail falls at the time of the second return of Christ ( It is done. ) A severe hailstorm is also mentioned in Revelation

3 Licensed from Shutterstock Revelation 8 (NIV) 7 The first angel sounded his trumpet, and there came hail and fire mixed with blood, and it was hurled down on the earth. A third of the earth was burned up, a third of the trees were burned up, and all the green grass was burned up. Revelation 11 (NIV) 19 Then God s temple in heaven was opened, and within his temple was seen the ark of his covenant. And there came flashes of lightning, rumblings, peals of thunder, an earthquake and a severe hailstorm. Revelation 16 (NIV) 17 The seventh angel poured out his bowl into the air, and out of the temple came a loud voice from the throne, saying, It is done! 18 Then there came flashes of lightning, rumblings, peals of thunder and a severe earthquake

4 No earthquake like it has ever occurred since mankind has been on earth, so tremendous was the quake. 19 The great city split into three parts, and the cities of the nations collapsed. God remembered Babylon the Great and gave her the cup filled with the wine of the fury of his wrath. 20 Every island fled away and the mountains could not be found. 21 From the sky huge hailstones, each weighing about a hundred pounds, fell on people. And they cursed God on account of the plague of hail, because the plague was so terrible. Some have interpreted the hail as a literal hailstorm, and certainly God could produce physical icy hail mixed with fire and blood, or physical hail weighing 100 pounds. But the more likely explanation is that the hail represents angels, both fallen satanic angels and good and more powerful heavenly angels aligned with Christ. The first hail in Revelation 8, mixed with fire and blood, represents the fallen satanic angels thrown down to earth as Satan (the blazing mountain, falling blazing star) fell to earth and convinced Mohammad in 610 that Jesus Christ was not the Messiah. The larger and more powerful hail that weighs 100 pounds occurs at the very end of the third and final woe. This occurs as the seventh and final bowel of wrath is poured out on the earth, and is at the same time of Christ returns to stop the second Islamic invasion of Israel and Jerusalem led by the Babylon-Persian kingdom. This larger and more powerful hail falls on the non-believers left on earth, and the hail represents the good and more powerful angels of Christ. The two invasions will only occur after the Jewish remnant returns to Israel (in 1948), and they have prospered, and live in peace. Persia will lead this invasion, along with other Islamic countries such as Put, which is Libya today, and Cush which is the Arabian peninsula today. The Islamic Man of Lawlessness will lead the first invasion and be killed. Gog the chief prince of Meshek and Tubal is the Islamic Man of Lawlessness, and the northern nations include Turkey, Iraq and Syria. Beth Togarmah is in modern Turkey today. The First Woe the Beginning of Islam Mohammad was born in Mecca in the year 570, was orphaned, and he spent his early years working at utterly menial jobs, including shepherding sheep selling pottery. Mohammad met a wealthy widow, Khadija, 15 years his senior, for whom he worked and ultimately married. Freed from financial concerns, he began to spend time in the solitude notably in some caves near Mecca and, in the year 610, received a message from an angel claiming to be Gabriel and designated him as the Messenger of God

5 When Mohammad shared his message, he won as converts only his wife and a few followers. Most of the pagans in Mecca merely scoffed at the new zealot. But his visions continued, and his wife and a politically powerful uncle protected him from persecution for a few years. In 622, however, opposition in Mecca escalated to the point that Muhammad and 70 followers fled north to the more hospitable city of Medina. This event the hijrah marks Islam s true beginning point. More important than the geographical repositioning was Mohammad s ideological shift. Once in Medina, he turned from religion to politics, relying less on persuasion than coercion. His followers became little more than bands of brigands, and as they raided camel caravans they enriched themselves while bringing money to the prophet and his movement. Victories in small-scale skirmishes brought admiration and acclaim from the warriorminded Arabs, and a battle at Badr in 624 proved particularly momentous, for the principles of jihad came to the fore. No mercy was extended to unbelievers or captives. The Koran (Surah 8:67) contains the following verse: "It is not for any Prophet to have captives until he hath made slaughter in the land." Fresh revelations described the unbelievers as "the worst animals." The Prophet was now the enemy of infidels. Killing, or in the case of Jews and Christians, enslaving and robbing them, was not only divinely sanctioned but "mandated. Within a decade, leading a victorious army, swollen by warriors fattened by plunder and power, Mohammad conquered Mecca, dying there in 632. After Mohammad s death in 632 the Islamic armies continued to destroy Christian lands and churches until the leaders (caliphs) changed their focus in 762 and built the new city of Baghdad--close to where they thought was the ancient city of Babylon. Licensed from Reuters But much damage was done in the 152 years from 610 to

6 The Christian writers who first took notice of the Islamic invasions in the 630s registered their alarm at the approach of the Arabs, whom they often Ishmaelites, and from the beginning they seem to have been aware of the fact that a new religious motivation inspired the invaders. For example, in a text written in Greek by a recently converted Palestinian Jew, probably in the year 634, the author tells of the incursions of the Arabs and of a False Prophet who had appeared among them, and of the statements that were made about him. The text reports a question put to a learned Jew, What can you tell me about the prophet who has appeared? To which he replied, He is false, for the prophets do not come armed with a sword, and the learned man states that the prophet may in fact be the Antichrist. Then, according to the text, the questioner made further inquiries and he heard from those who had met him that there was no truth to be found in the so-called prophet, only the shedding of men's blood. He says also that he has the keys of paradise, which is incredible. (Quoted from the Doctrina Jacobi Nuperbaptizati, as translated in Hoyland, Seeing Islam as Others Saw It, p 57. Also see David M. Olster, Roman Defeat, Christian Response, and the Literary Construction of the Jew (Philadelphia: Univ. of Pennsylvania Press, 1994), p ) Middle East Christian World in 610 AD

7 Middle East Christian World in 762 AD Arab military forces, mightily inspired by Islam, had consolidated their control over a large stretch of territory outside of Arabia, which thereafter would become the heartland of the enduring Commonwealth of Islam. This expanse of territory, embracing major portions of the Babylon, Roman and Persian empires of Late Antiquity, included numerous Christians. The present territory of Iraq and Syria is the same region of the ancient political Babylon of the Bible. Christians were by far the majority of the population in the former Roman provinces, in the three so-called Oriental Patriarchates of Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem, as well as in North Africa and Spain, where the government had been officially Christian. The Christians also constituted a demographic minority in the land of the Persians, where for all their numbers they never in fact enjoyed any significant political preferment. This occurred despite the fact that there were many Christians living in the Muslim countries for another four centuries. However they would always be under the control of the Muslims from that day forward

8 Who Was the Angel Gabriel? It is highly unlikely the Angel Gabriel who appeared to Mary to inform her that she would be giving birth to the Messiah, is the same Angel Gabriel that appeared to Mohammad and told him that Jesus was really not the Messiah. Most likely the Angel Gabriel that appeared to Mohammad was Satan in disguise. We know some time after Christ's ascension there was a final battle in heaven, and Satan was removed from heaven and fell back to earth. This battle is described in several places in the Bible, especially in Revelation 12. Satan was enraged because he knew his time was short. Revelation 12 (NIV) 4 The dragon stood in front of the woman who was about to give birth, so that it might devour her child the moment he was born. 5 She gave birth to a son, a male child, who will rule all the nations with an iron scepter. And her child was snatched up to God and to his throne. 6 The woman fled into the wilderness to a place prepared for her by God, where she might be taken care of for 1,260 days. 7 Then war broke out in heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought back. 8 But he was not strong enough, and they lost their place in heaven. 9 The great dragon was hurled down that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray. He was hurled to the earth, and his angels with him. 13 When the dragon saw that he had been hurled to the earth, he pursued the woman who had given birth to the male child. 14 The woman was given the two wings of a great eagle, so that she might fly to the place prepared for her in the wilderness, where she would be taken care of for a time, times and half a time, out of the serpent s reach. 15 Then from his mouth the serpent spewed water like a river, to overtake the woman and sweep her away with the torrent. 16 But the earth helped the woman by opening its mouth and swallowing the river that the dragon had spewed out of his mouth. 17 Then the dragon was enraged at the woman and went off to wage war against the rest of her offspring those who keep God s commands and hold fast their testimony about Jesus

9 We can get a better understanding of the Angel Gabriel from a quote from Mohammed himself. Mohammed said every time he had a revelation "he felt like his soul was being torn from his chest." This is certainly unlike any experience that Christian has when they are baptized and receive the Holy Spirit. The only entity that could tear your soul from you is Satan himself. We are next told the woe continues. Let's look further at the first woe of Revelation chapter 9. Revelation 9 (NIV) 1 The fifth angel sounded his trumpet, and I saw a star that had fallen from the sky to the earth. The star was given the key to the shaft of the Abyss. 2 When he opened the Abyss, smoke rose from it like the smoke from a gigantic furnace. The sun and sky were darkened by the smoke from the Abyss. 3 And out of the smoke locusts came down on the earth and were given power like that of scorpions of the earth. 4 They were told not to harm the grass of the earth or any plant or tree, but only those people who did not have the seal of God on their foreheads. 5 They were not allowed to kill them but only to torture them for five months. And the agony they suffered was like that of the sting of a scorpion when it strikes. 6 During those days people will seek death but will not find it; they will long to die, but death will elude them. 7 The locusts looked like horses prepared for battle. On their heads they wore something like crowns of gold, and their faces resembled human faces. 8 Their hair was like women s hair, and their teeth were like lions teeth. 9 They had breastplates like breastplates of iron, and the sound of their wings was like the thundering of many horses and chariots rushing into battle. 10 They had tails with stingers, like scorpions, and in their tails they had power to torment people for five months. 11 They had as king over them the angel of the Abyss, whose name in Hebrew is Abaddon and in Greek is Apollyon (that is, Destroyer). 12 The first woe is past; two other woes are yet to come. These verses again mean Satan fell to earth and convinced Mohammad in 610 that Jesus Christ was not the Messiah. Shortly thereafter Mohammad and his warriors destroyed over 20,000 Christian churches representing about a third of all the churches in the world. That s what the third of everything being destroyed means

10 Revelation 9 says locusts come out of dark smoke and have the power to sting like a scorpion. We are given the image of a horde of locusts streaming across the earth. The locust swarms are symbolic of the Islamic warriors streaming across the Christian lands. The dark smoke is the false doctrine of the Koran. This woe only hurts those who do not have the seal of God on the foreheads. This means the false doctrine of Islam only damages the souls of people who believe it and do not accept Christ. Those that believe in the Gospel cannot be harmed spiritually. Licensed from Shutterstock Licensed from Shutterstock It s important to understand how much the world changed once Satan as a fake Angel Gabriel appeared to Mohammad and created the first woe. Most of areas in the Middle East were Christian in the year 600 and yet by 610 things started to change dramatically. Over the next 152 years (until 762) the Christian church was almost completely destroyed in the Middle East by Islam. "And all the green grass was burned up" in Revelation 8:7 means the Gospels of Christ would never return to these areas. This is true to this day One of the tenets of Islam is that of jihad, or a holy war. Few Americans had heard the term jihad before the attack on America on September 11, Even then, for fear of anti-islamic backlash, secular newscasters were reminding Americans that Islam is a peaceful religion. Yet few commentators were familiar with the Islamic scriptures that allow for war and death to the infidel

11 Revelation 9:6 During those days people will seek death but will not find it; they will long to die, but death will elude them. Licensed from Shutterstock On the day of judgment all of those that have followed the false teaching of Islam will kneel in front of Christ. When they learn that they are going to be separated from God for all eternity they would rather just be dead. That is what revelation 9:6 means when it says: "during those days people will seek death but will not find it; they will long to die but death will elude them." A physical death is preferable to eternal separation from God. Revelation tells us the first woe lasts five months. Five months is symbolically 152 days or literally 152 years. This time period begins from the year 610 when Satan first appeared to Mohammad, until Islamic leaders stopped their conquests and focused their efforts on building a capital in the new city of Baghdad in 762. This site was picked to be very near the ancient location of Babylon itself. Revelation says the second woe involves satanic Angels that come from the river Euphrates-- meaning the center of Islamic world. This woe will continue until one third of the world is killed, meaning by being Muslim and their souls are spiritually killed. The second woe is about the worldwide spread of Islam. The number of people is too large to count. Revelation tells us their power comes from their mouths-meaning Islamic false teachings and false doctrine

12 Revelation 9 (NIV) 12 The first woe is past; two other woes are yet to come. 13 The sixth angel sounded his trumpet, and I heard a voice coming from the four horns of the golden altar that is before God. 14 It said to the sixth angel who had the trumpet, Release the four angels who are bound at the great river Euphrates. 15 And the four angels who had been kept ready for this very hour and day and month and year were released to kill a third of mankind. 16 The number of the mounted troops was twice ten thousand times ten thousand. I heard their number. Islam Interpretation: Release the four angels who are bound at the great river Euphrates. means the Islamic Babylon world under Mohammad that was attacking Christians and the church (first woe ), and thereafter up to this very day continuously spreading Satan s false doctrine that Christ is not the Son of God, and not the risen Messiah (second woe). And the four angels who had been kept ready for this very hour and day and month and year were released to kill a third of mankind means the vast number of Islamic followers (Muslims) since the time of Mohammad that face eternal damnation. (kill your soul not your physical body) The number of the mounted troops was twice ten thousand times ten thousand. The actual Greek literal translation is 2 times an incalculable number. The number of the Islamic hordes and current day Muslims lost to Satan are vast and cannot be counted. According to Pew Research the proportionate Islamic growth of the world's population is about +1.60% per decade. If current relative trend line growth rates continue, the 33.3% peak in the second woe is reached around the time frame

13 Pew Estimates of Muslim Growth % of World Muslim Population % of World Growth ,599,700, % ,907,110, % 1.70% ,209,270, % 1.60% ,497,830, % 1.60% ,761,480, % 1.60% 2060 (Est) 3,037,628, % 1.60% 2070 (Est) 3,341,390, % 1.60% 2075 (Est) 3,675,529, % 0.80% Estimates continue the trend line 1.60% fraction of world per decade Muslim relative growth rates Satan convinced Mohammed that, while the Gospels were correct when originally written, they became "corrupted" by the apostles. There is actually no evidence of this corruption. One way to help Muslims read absolutely "uncorrupted" scripture is to read the Dead Sea Scrolls. Since the Dead Sea Scrolls have been carbon dated the 100 to 300 years before Christ, they certainly would not be corrupted by the apostles. The Dead Sea Isaiah Scroll allows Muslims to begin their path towards salvation. They can read uncorrupted scripture that is older than Jesus. The Word of God in the Isaiah text Scripture found in the ancient Dead Sea Scroll tells us everything we need to know for salvation. We know that God gave us the gift of a sacrifice from his son Jesus Christ. God caused Jesus Christ to die for our sins and then raised him up from the dead. Because of the sacrifice all believe in Christ will have eternal presence with God. Those that reject Christ will be forever separated from God on the day of judgment. We pray that all Muslims have a chance to understand the truth of the Holy Scripture and the full Gospels while there is still time