Good evening and welcome to EBible Fellowship's Bible study in the Book of Revelation.  Tonight is study #39 of Revelation, chapter 14, and we continue to look at Revelation14:14:

And I looked, and behold a white cloud, and upon the cloud one sat like unto the Son of man, having on his head a golden crown, and in his hand a sharp sickle.

We have spent a good amount of time reviewing the word “cloud” in the Bible and we saw that it relates to the commandments of God and to the judgment of God, as God brings judgment through His Word, the Bible.  He did that, beginning with the churches and congregations, when He opened the Scriptures to reveal that judgment begins at the house of God and to reveal the timeline for that judgment (the 23 years of the Great Tribulation) and the appointed time of judgment upon the world, beginning May 21, 2011.  All this information came forth from the Bible.  The Bible is a spiritual Book and as it brings forth truth, it brought forth the spiritual judgment upon the churches and then upon the world and we have been living in the Day of Judgment ever since that date of May 21, 2011.

Here, in Revelation 14, we are reading information that God is giving, the One who knows the end from the beginning.  He wrote in His Word nearly two thousand years ago of things that perfectly describe events of our present day in this time of judgment for this world.  We see that Jesus is “sitting upon a white cloud.”  He is the Judge of all the earth and He is ruling over the unsaved inhabitants of the earth.  To “sit” points to ruling and that is why it says that He has on His head a golden crown.

It is interesting, when we search the Bible regarding a golden crown we find corresponding information in the Book of Esther.  In chapter 6, chapter 7 and chapter 8, as well as in other chapters in that Book, we find that Haman, the enemy of the Jews, is hanged on “the seventeenth day of the second month.”  We went through the Book of Esther a couple of years ago, and we saw how God points to that particular date as a very significant date because May 21, 2011 had the underlying Hebrew calendar date of “the seventeenth day of the second month.”  It is the date that Haman was hanged.  It is also important because when God brought the flood in the days of Noah, the flood came on “the seventeenth day of the second month.”  Then seven thousand years later on the equivalent day, on May 21, 2011, in the 23^rd full year and the 8,400^th day of the Great Tribulation, it just so happened (as some might have us to think) to have the underlying date of 2/17, which matched precisely with the day the flood began.  So that date of 2/17 points to the judgment of the flood and it points to the final judgment as judgment began on this earth on May 21, 2011, and Haman, the enemy of the Jews and a type of Satan, is hanged on that day.  Then we read that Esther petitioned her husband the king to put away the evil Haman had intended, as Haman had devised a plan to kill all the Jews.  The Jews would represent all of God’s elect.  In this historical parable, King Ahasuerus reigned over 127 provinces and the number “127” points to all of God’s elect.  (Sarah died at the age of 127 and she is “the mother of us all, the Bible says.)  This King Ahasuerus issued a decree for the Jews to fight back and do battle with their enemies.  This is fitting and is in keeping with what we have been learning in the Book of Jeremiah at this time, as God commands His people to “publish and conceal not,” and to come against Babylon.  This is further confirmed by this historical parable in the Book of Esther.  After Haman is hanged, the decree is issued that allows the Jews to fight back and to kill their enemies.  In that context, we read of Mordecai, a type of Christ, in Esther 8:15:

And Mordecai went out from the presence of the king in royal apparel of blue and white, and with a great crown of gold, and with a garment of fine linen and purple: and the city of Shushan rejoiced and was glad.

Mordecai was given the house of Haman and he was given rule over all that Haman had previously ruled over.  Again, we have to see the connection God is making here.  On Judgment Day, God deposed Satan from all rule that the Lord had previously given him in the churches and the greatly increased rule over the world as iniquity and sin was multiplying in the world.  God took away of the official rule of Satan on May 21, 2011 and the Lord Jesus took over the house of Satan, the kingdoms of this world, just as Mordecai took over the house of Haman.  God also issued the command to His people to publish these things and to fight against Babylon, as we read in Jeremiah, chapters 50 and 51.  That is why we see pictured, in Revelation 14:14, the Lord Jesus “sitting,” or ruling, and He is sitting on a cloud, pointing to the judgment coming forth from the Word of God, and He is “like unto the Son of man, having on his head a golden crown, and in his hand a sharp sickle.”

So let us take a look at that phrase: “and in his hand a sharp sickle.”  We know that “hand” in the Bible typifies the will of an individual, depending on whose hand it is.  Here, it is the hand of the Lord Jesus Christ, who is Eternal God, and, therefore, it is the will of God that there is a sharp sickle in His hand.  Now the sickle is a threshing instrument, an instrument for “harvest.”  In other studies, we have looked at how God uses His people as instruments to bring judgment.  At this point, we are not going to get into that, but we want to look at the “sharp sickle.”

First of all, the Greek word that is translated as “sickle” in this verse is used seven times in this chapter, in verses 14 through 20, and we going to repeatedly read of the sickle.  For instance, it says in Revelation 14:15:

And another angel came out of the temple, crying with a loud voice to him that sat on the cloud, Thrust in thy sickle, and reap: for the time is come for thee to reap; for the harvest of the earth is ripe.

The word “sickle” is going to be repeated again, and again, and again.  There is tremendous emphasis on the “sickle.”  We wonder what the “sickle” represents.  The Greek word translated as “sickle” appears seven times here, but only once in another place and it is also translated there as “sickle,” so that does not help us too much in trying to spiritually define what the sickle means.  We know it is an instrument for threshing in harvest and for gathering in the crop.  We want the Bible to help us, but we are not given much help in the New Testament Greek. But in the Old Testament we find a passage in the Book of Joel and I am going to read it.  I think if you read Joel 3:12-16 and then read Revelation 14:14-20, you will see how very similar these passages are, so let me read a few verses here, in Joel 3:12:

Let the heathen be wakened, and come up to the valley of Jehoshaphat: for there will I sit to judge all the heathen round about.

Notice it says that God will “sit to judge” and in our verse in Revelation 14:14, the Son of man is “sitting upon a cloud” and He is judging the nations, just as it says here, “For there will I sit to judge all the heathen round about,” and the word “heathens” can be translated as “nations.”  Then it goes on to say in Joel 3:13-14:

Put ye in the sickle, for the harvest is ripe: come, get you down; for the press is full, the fats overflow; for their wickedness is great. Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision…

This word “decision” is translated in other places as “threshing.”  So it actually says, “Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of threshing: for the day of JEHOVAH is near in the valley of threshing.”  So, again, these verses have everything to do with “harvest,” just as in Revelation 14:14.  Then it goes on to say in Joel 3:15:

The sun and the moon shall be darkened, and the stars shall withdraw their shining.

Here is the “clue” or the key phrase, where God locks in the time period He is speaking of and we can recognize the language.  We have seen it, again and again, in passages that have to do with Judgment Day, the day of the Lord at the end of the world, as it says in Matthew 24:29:

Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven…

Here we see, in Joel 3, that God is speaking of judging the nations and He is using the language of putting in the sickle because “the harvest is ripe” and the “fats overflow,” and the “fats” is the winepress and this compares with Revelation 14:20, where the blood comes out of the winepress and flows for the space of 1,600 furlongs.  There is tremendous identification with Joel 3:13 and Revelation 14:20.  In addition, God is locking in when this is taking place, immediately after the Tribulation, by tying the language of harvest together with verse 15: “The sun and the moon shall be darkened, and the stars shall withdraw their shining.”  This means we are correct and we have a proper understanding that once the Tribulation concludes, then Judgment Day begins, which is the final harvest.  It is just as Mark 4:29 says that when the fruit is brought forth, immediately the sickle is put in.  So you can see that when we are reading Revelation 14:14 and we are saying that this happened May 21, 2011 and the days after that, Joel, chapter 3 gives support for that conclusion; we are not drawing our conclusion out of thin air our pulling it out of a hat, but Joel 3 is making the tie-in with Matthew 24:29 and May 21, 2011 was the end of the 23-year Great Tribulation.  It was the transition day to those days “immediately after that tribulation” when the sun is darkened, and so on.  When Joel 3 tells is that the sun and the moon are darkened, we can understand that it is Judgment Day and it is speaking of harvest.

So it says in Joel 3:13: “Put ye in the sickle, for the harvest is ripe.”  It said back in Revelation 14 that the Lord had in His hand a sharp sickle and then it says in Revelation 14:15:

And another angel came out of the temple, crying with a loud voice to him that sat on the cloud, Thrust in thy sickle, and reap…

In this verse, the Greek word translated as “thrust” is overwhelmingly translated in other places as “send,” so it would say, “Send in thy sickle, and reap.”  Lord willing, we will talk about the great significance of that in a future study.  Likewise, in Joel 3:13, where it says, “Put ye in the sickle,” the Hebrew word translated as “put in” is a word that is also translated as “send” in the Old Testament, so we can clearly see how God is using very similar language in both of these passages.

What about this word “sickle,” where it says, “Thrust in they sickle,” in Revelation 14:15?  It is helpful when a Greek word is translated as two or three or more English words and we can see how the other words are used in their context, to help us develop a greater understanding of the word.  But this is not the case when the word is always translated as the same English word.  It is the same situation in the Old Testament with this word.  The Hebrew word is Strong’s #4038 and it is always translated as “sickle.”  You are probably wondering why we came here, if it is not providing any help.  However, in the Hebrew the consonants were given by God; that is, if you look in the Interlinear at the Hebrew text, you can see the consonants.  For instance, in the case of the word “sickle,” it is made up of “Mem,” “Gimel” and “Lamed.”  If you want to know what those letters look like, you can go to Psalm 119.  Remember how God wonderfully wrote that Psalm using each letter of the Hebrew alphabet and our Bibles give us the “letters.”  Again, these letters are “Mem,” “Gimel” and “Lamed,” which make up Strong’s word #4038.  Then there are vowels, or vowel pointing, that was added at a later time; God did not give the vowel pointing.  It was the Jewish people that added the vowels to the consonants that God gave and that means when we see a word that has the same consonants, when we find the Strong’s words (in this case) #4039 and #4040 have the same consonants as the word #4038, but they have different vowel pointing.  Yet, we can understand (at the very least) that there is a relationship and there may be a closer relationship than we might think between those words.  Now #4039 and #4040 have the consonants “Mem,” “Gimel” and “Lamed” and they also have a “Hei” ending, which is like the Hebrew “H” sound and it is often added as the ending of Hebrew words, so that does not change the importance of the three consonants being the same. 

When we look at #4039 and #4040, we find it can be translated as “roll” and in one case it is translated as “volume.”  In Jeremiah 36, the Lord goes into detail to describe how He wrote the Bible by showing the way He brought divine revelation to Jeremiah and Baruch, Jeremiah’s scribe, would write the words down in a roll.  I am going to read Jeremiah 36:1-6:

And it came to pass in the fourth year of Jehoiakim the son of Josiah king of Judah, that this word came unto Jeremiah from JEHOVAH, saying, Take thee a roll of a book, and write therein all the words that I have spoken unto thee against Israel, and against Judah, and against all the nations, from the day I spake unto thee, from the days of Josiah, even unto this day. It may be that the house of Judah will hear all the evil which I purpose to do unto them; that they may return every man from his evil way; that I may forgive their iniquity and their sin. Then Jeremiah called Baruch the son of Neriah: and Baruch wrote from the mouth of Jeremiah all the words of JEHOVAH, which he had spoken unto him, upon a roll of a book. And Jeremiah commanded Baruch, saying, I am shut up; I cannot go into the house of JEHOVAH: Therefore go thou, and read in the roll, which thou hast written from my mouth, the words of JEHOVAH in the ears of the people in the JEHOVAH'S house upon the fasting day: and also thou shalt read them in the ears of all Judah that come out of their cities.

Jeremiah 36 is a very interesting chapter, where the words of Jeremiah were written on the roll of a book and it was brought before the king of Judah and he cut them with a pen knife and burned them in a fire.  Then God said to Jeremiah that He will give him the Words again and they just rewrote what they had written before and it just illustrates how God brought divine revelation to His prophets, as He moved in them to record His Word: all Scripture is given by inspiration of God.  It really is a great passage that shows how the Bible was written.

The “roll” that the Word of God was written upon represents the Bible, the Word of God.  The word translated as “roll” many times in Jeremiah 36 is the word that is closely related to the word “sickle.”  It has the same consonants.  Again, the vowel pointing is different, but it has the same three consonants, which shows a relationship.  Of course, when we think about it, God uses His Word to accomplish His harvest, to bring His judgment, to gather His people or to cast the tares into the fire; it all occurs in the Word of God, so the word of God is like a sickle, and not just a sickle, but as a “sharp sickle,” as we read in Revelation 14:14. 

When we look up the word “sharp,” what do we find?  It is a word that is often used with the idea of a “sword.”  It says in Revelation 1:16:

And he had in his right hand seven stars: and out of his mouth went a sharp twoedged sword…

Also, it says in Revelation 2:12:

And to the angel of the church in Pergamos write; These things saith he which hath the sharp sword with two edges;

And, again, in Revelation 19:15:

And out of his mouth goeth a sharp sword, that with it he should smite the nations: and he shall rule them with a rod of iron…

The “sharp sword” describes the Word of God and God gives us that definition in Hebrews 4:12:

For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword…

But in our verse in Revelation 14:14, it is not a sharp twoedged sword, but it is a “sharp sickle” or a sharp “roll,” which points to the Word of God. 

A friend mentioned to me recently that a “sickle” has only one side.  We are used to seeing a picture of a sickle and it looks like a half moon with a handle.  You put the sickle to whatever grain you are gathering and it “cuts.”  It is not a two-edged sickle, but it cuts “one way,” and I think that is what God is indicating here.  He does not say that in His hand is a twoedged sword with which to reap, but it is a “sharp sickle.”  Historically, the Word of God has cut to “judgment” or cut to “salvation.”  It has brought grace and mercy in salvation and it has brought condemnation and wrath in judgment on the wicked.  But, in this case, in the time of judgment, it only cuts one way.  None will hear and become saved.  None will experience grace or mercy.  It is only the wrath of God that is coming down upon the nations of the world.