END OF TIME PROPHECIES 166

The doom of the beast- worshippers                          Revelation 14v9-11. 

The truth that is presented here in a loud voice is distasteful to man, because man has no conception of the holiness of God (refer Isaiah 6v1-7).   Attention is now turned from the downfall of a corrupt world system to the torment of individual people who have spurned God's mercy.   To embrace the beast by receiving his mark, is to reject Christ the only hope of salvation.   The beast and the false prophet will go down and all who follow them will go down with them.   God's final message to the world is that salvation is only in His Son (Hebrews 1v1-3).   To turn away from this that is called  "so great salvation" is the ultimate sin and will consign those to eternal damnation.   We note immediately the solemnity of this.   He says  "if any man worship the beast....." (verse 9).   We must consider the dreadful truth of these verses and will do so in three ways:

The wrath of God will be merciless.     (Chapter 14v10a) says  "the same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God which is poured out without mixture into the cup of His indignation." Those who get drunk with the mesmerising falsehoods of the beast, and swallow his hollow promises, will be made to drink of the wine of God's wrath, which will be poured out undiluted (that is at full strength).   This undiluted wrath first fell on Jesus at Calvary but now it will fall on those who reject it.   This truth is almost too solemn for words, but it must be told.   (Zephaniah 1v17-18) describes "the day of the Lord's wrath."   The bible is full of warnings to those who would reject Christ.   "It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God."   (Hebrews 10v31).   The same chapter speaks in (verse 27)  of "a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversaries."   The stark reality is this; the God who made heaven also made hell; the God who will bless eternally  His saints, will also consign unbelievers to eternal damnation.                                                                               

The wrath of God will be torment.     Of course we have no idea what this will mean and so it is described in language that we can understand.

            1.   It will be physical torment.  This is the meaning of the fire.   The  people of Sodom and Gomorrah have been  "set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.   Jesus Himself spoke in Mark 9v43-44  "the fire that shall never be quenched."     The prophet Isaiah in the last verse of his prophecy says of those who have transgressed against God  "for their worm shall not die, neither shall their fire be quenched."  The man in (Luke 16v24)  said  "I am tormented in this flame."

          2.     The torment will be mental.     Again in  (Isaiah 66v24 and also Mark 9v44)   "their worm shall not die."  The gnawing torment of lost opportunity of loved ones who warned them, of unfulfilled ambitions, with no hope for the future leading to a perpetual existence of  "gnashing of teeth"  in an eternal existence of despair.

          3.     The torment will be emotional.     Paul speaks in (Romans 2v9) of "tribulation and anguish upon every soul of man that doeth evil."   Anguish of the soul goes deeper than even the pains of the body and of the mind. 

The judgment will be endless and perpetual.      The words used are  "eternal" - "everlasting" - "forever" -   "forever and ever" and all of these express endless duration (Matthew 25v46).  It is also irreversible.    (Revelation 20v14)  calls it  "the second death."   There is salvation beyond the first death which is physical death, but there is none beyond the second death.   Again the man in (Luke 16 v26) it was said  "between us and you there is a great gulf fixed so that they which would pass from hence to you cannot neither can they pass to us that would come from thence."  Eternal judgment is stated in (Hebrews 6v1-2) to be one of the foundation principles of the Christian faith.   Not only is the torment endless it is also perpetual because it says  "and the smoke of their torment ascendeth up forever and ever and they have no rest day nor night."   There will be no break in the torment, no pause, no sleep, no relief.   All this of course is unacceptable to the human mind but the rejection of it will not alter the fact of it, their smoke the evidence of their suffering will be forever rising.   Now do we understand why God would go to such lengths to save us from that.   We must repeat at the end of such a tortuous discussion that God does not wish anyone to be there and has made provision so that they need not be there, but He will have us bowing to Him and worshipping Him not lesser creations, far less men who have been inspired by the devil.  

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