Good evening and welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the Book of Revelation. Tonight is study #13 of Revelation, chapter 16, and we are going to be reading Revelation 16:10-12:

And the fifth angel poured out his vial upon the seat of the beast; and his kingdom was full of darkness; and they gnawed their tongues for pain, And blasphemed the God of heaven because of their pains and their sores, and repented not of their deeds. And the sixth angel poured out his vial upon the great river Euphrates; and the water thereof was dried up, that the way of the kings of the east might be prepared.

In our last study we looked at the Greek word for “pain” that was found in verse 10 and verse 11. Now we are going to look at the word translated as “sores.” An open “sore” in the Bible indicates God’s wrath; that is, it is a “sore” that is continuous; it cannot be healed. It is an indicator that one is under the wrath of God because healing of a sore would point to salvation and the lack of healing indicates there is no salvation.

Deuteronomy, chapter 28 is a chapter in which God speaks of the curses of disobedience from verse 15 to the end of the chapter and it says in Deuteronomy 28:35:

JEHOVAH shall smite thee in the knees, and in the legs, with a sore botch that cannot be healed, from the sole of thy foot unto the top of thy head.

Notice that it is God that is doing the smiting and it is a “sore botch than cannot be healed.” For instance, it is the judgment of God when God does not save a sinner or when He brought judgment against the churches. Corporately, the church was smitten and it was as if the individuals within had these “sores” upon them and, yet, there was no healing – there was “no balm in Gilead.” There was no medicine of the Gospel because it must be applied by the Lord Jesus Christ.

It says in Deuteronomy 28:59-61:

Then JEHOVAH will make thy plagues wonderful, and the plagues of thy seed, even great plagues, and of long continuance, and sore sicknesses, and of long continuance. Moreover he will bring upon thee all the diseases of Egypt, which thou wast afraid of; and they shall cleave unto thee. Also every sickness, and every plague, which is not written in the book of this law, them will JEHOVAH bring upon thee, until thou be destroyed.

The plagues and diseases and “sore” sicknesses all represent the same thing, spiritually. Someone suffering from them would be a picture of someone under the wrath of God. Remember what we read when God afflicted Job, where it says in Job 2:6:

And JEHOVAH said unto Satan, Behold, he is in thine hand; but save his life. So went Satan forth from the presence of JEHOVAH, and smote Job with sore boils from the sole of his foot unto his crown.

This is similar to what we read in Deuteronomy 28, because Job is a type of Christ under the wrath of God. This language of being struck with “sore boils from the sole of his foot unto his crown” is language that applies to anyone or any entity that is under God’s judgment, whether it be the Lord Jesus Christ, Israel of old or the New Testament churches.

Also, in the Old Testament in Ezekiel, chapter 14 God speaks of “sore judgments.” It says in Ezekiel 14:21:

For thus saith the Lord JEHOVAH; How much more when I send my four sore judgments upon Jerusalem, the sword, and the famine, and the noisome beast, and the pestilence, to cut off from it man and beast?

The “sore judgments” of God is what the word “sores” point to and in our verse it said, “and they gnawed their tongues for pain, And blasphemed the God of heaven because of their pains and their sores.” We saw that the word “pain” is related to wickedness and evil; sin always brings “pain.” And unsaved mankind “blasphemed the God of heaven because of their pains.” Their sins have brought ruin to them in the Day of Judgment because they are not saved and now they cannot be saved. And they blasphemed God because of their “pains and their sores.”

Just to remind us, the Greek word for “blasphemed” is very similar to the English translation and it means to “speak evil of” and we have gone over this before. You can look up the word “blaspheme,” which I think is Strong’s #987, and it means to “speak evil of,” and in our verse they blasphemed God “because of their pains and their sores.” Is this something that unsaved men do? Yes, it is, whether they are the unsaved within the churches or outside the churches. Men have a tendency to speak evil of God and, if not directly, they will speak evil of His doctrine. We looked at this a little while ago, but let us look at it again, in 1Timothy 6:1:

Let as many servants as are under the yoke count their own masters worthy of all honour, that the name of God and his doctrine be not blasphemed.

When we think of faithful Bible doctrines, are they spoken evil of? For instance, what about the doctrine of election? All of God’s people know that God is the one who is in complete control of who He saves. It is the doctrine of election. Do people speak evil of this? Oh, yes, they do, and especially the churches. Do people speak evil of the doctrine of the Sunday Sabbath? They say, “You are trying to impose a works gospel on me by trying to tell me to keep the Sunday Sabbath.” Yes, they speak evil of the idea of keeping Sunday holy because it is the New Testament Sabbath day. Do they speak evil of God’s Law concerning marriage and divorce? They respond, “Oh, it is an archaic thought to say we cannot divorce if a marriage is not working.” Do they speak evil of God’s Law that says marriage is to be between a man and a woman and not between two men or two women? Yes, without question, men speak evil of this most basic truth of the Bible that mankind had adhered to throughout history until just relatively recently. Now it is evil spoken against. They say, “You are holding back love. You are trying to tear people apart when all they want to do is love one another.” Do you see how it can be mischaracterized? Yet, it is God’s doctrine. God is the one who said, “What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder.” From the beginning it was a man and a woman that were to be joined. It is very clear and there is no doubt about it. Actually, God speaks of the sin of homosexuality as an abomination. God is the one that can speak evil of or condemn a thing, because He is God and He tells the truth. God says witchcraft is an evil thing, but men reply, “There is no problem with that; it is just an alternative lifestyle to be a wizard or a warlock or a witch.” With everything God commands, the world turns it around, perverts it, changes it, distorts it and dismisses it. They do whatever they want and they do not want to have to listen to the Word of God.

For example, the world cannot even put up with the idea of Christmas and observing a holiday in which the Lord Jesus Christ is the object of our attention, so they turn Christmas into “Santa Claus” and they turn Easter into an “Easter bunny.” Again, and again, and again, God and his doctrine is blasphemed and especially in this Day of Judgment, in this evil time. The creature is being served and worshipped more than the Creator and the doctrine of evolution blasphemes and speaks evil of the true Word of God. God tells us, “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth,” but men respond, “Oh, it is not so.” They actually think the basis of being considered an intelligent person is to believe in such a ridiculous theory as evolution, but the truth is “spoken evil of,” and through all these things (and many more), God is blasphemed because it is His truth and His doctrine.

Men cannot stand true doctrine and they are no longer even willing to put up a front that they might be standing for the truths of the Word of God, the Bible. They are speaking evil of the God of heaven today when they deny that the Bible says the church age is over. If we were to take a poll within any denomination today about the doctrine of the end of the church age, you would hear that doctrine be “evil spoken of.” Or, bring up the doctrine of the appointed Day of Judgment, May 21, 2011, if you want to hear something being “evil spoken of” in both the churches and the world. Or, bring up the doctrine that God “revealeth his secret unto his servants the prophets,” and it will be ignored or dismissed with a wave of the hand and their casual response will be: “No man knows.”

There is much evil being spoken of God and His doctrine. At this time, it is a result of God shutting the door to heaven. Like no other doctrine, the teaching that God has ended His salvation program and is no longer saving people stirs up an angry response. It stirs up the anger, arrogance and pride in man: “How dare you say such a thing!” In their understanding of God, God would not do such a thing. They do not bother to check it out and search the Scriptures to see if these things are so. They know that their God would never allow the world to continue on without salvation and, yet, this is the God of the Bible who speaks of judging mankind and this is the judgment of God upon mankind. But they will not accept these things.

It goes on to say in Revelation 16:11:

And blasphemed the God of heaven because of their pains and their sores, and repented not of their deeds.

This is similar to the end of verse 9 of this chapter: “and blasphemed the name of God…and they repented not to give him glory.” This is the second time in just a couple of verses where God says, “they repented not of their deeds,” and He will say it another time later on in this chapter. It is an indicator of man’s sinful condition when he will not repent.

First of all, repentance is a part of salvation. Someone who becomes saved is granted the gift of repentance because they have already received a “new heart” in their soul existence. In their “old heart” and old nature, they were constantly spewing forth sin and when God gave them a “new heart,” all that sinful activity ceased. The “new heart” is perfect and cannot sin, according to 1John and, of course, this is true. God would not take out your old heart contaminated with sin and give you a new heart that was also contaminated with sin. Would that make any sense? Of course, it does not. It is a new resurrected soul and a “new heart” and a “new spirit.” That is the language of the Bible and, yet, some people continue to insist, “We can still sin in our new heart.” No – we cannot sin in that new heart, if, indeed, it is a new heart. It is pure, holy and without sin. The sin we continue to do after salvation is not coming from the heart; the heart is not the source of the sin any longer, but it comes from the sinful physical body. This is why the Apostle Paul said, “For I delight in the law of God after the inward man,” but then he added, “who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” The problem is the physical “body.” We need the resurrection of the body, so we continue to sin through the body, but not through the “heart.” God has given us a new heart and spirit and, therefore, repentance is part of the gift of salvation and we are now able to perfectly obey God from the heart.

But unsaved man can no longer truly repent. They cannot repent because God is not granting anyone the “new heart.” True repentance is not turning from an outward sin like smoking, drinking, doing drugs, cursing, and lying, and so on. That is the world’s definition of “repentance.” You stop doing something wrong or something unhealthy and you start doing something better and healthier for yourself. The Biblical definition is that we must repent from the heart and this is why God says, in Isaiah 31, that He must turn us and after we are turned, we have repented. It is an act of God and part of the gift of salvation. Today no one is being saved, so no one is repenting from their sins, so it says, “They repented not of their deeds.” That is a true and accurate description of every unsaved individual in the world since May 21, 2011. There has not been even one person that has repented in a Biblical manner from their evil deeds.

We went over Revelation 9 earlier, where the 200 million horsemen slew the “third part of men” which represented those in the churches when May 21, 2011 came and, in effect, killed those within the corporate church body. But the Lord went on to speak of others that were not part of the “third part” in Revelation 9:20-21:

And the rest of the men which were not killed by these plagues yet repented not of the works of their hands, that they should not worship devils, and idols of gold, and silver, and brass, and stone, and of wood: which neither can see, nor hear, nor walk: Neither repented they of their murders, nor of their sorceries, nor of their fornication, nor of their thefts.

This is speaking of every unsaved person in the world outside of the churches. God had just finished addressing the “third part” (the churches) and now He is speaking of the “rest of the men which were not killed by these plagues.” Since they were outside the churches, it was possible that God could have saved them prior to May 21, 2011, so when we encountered a Muslim, a Buddhist, a Hindu, an atheist or anybody else outside of the churches there was no guarantee God could not have saved them prior to shutting the door of heaven on May 21, 2011. But there is a guarantee that those that stayed in the churches and congregations could not possibly have been saved prior to God’s shutting of the door of heaven. And, of course, after God shut the door, no one could become saved, so in essence the “third part” was killed, spiritually, when God shut the door of heaven, but “the rest of the men” were not killed by that particular plague. As the Day of Judgment, this prolonged period of time, has continued they have “repented not.” The unsaved of the world continue in their sins; they are not turning back. They are not saying, “Let us stop shopping on Sundays and let us observe the Lord’s Day, as the world did a few decades ago.” They are not going in that direction. They are not saying, “This idea of men marrying men is not found in the Bible. It is very obvious.” That is not happening. They are not repentant because God is not turning anyone and the unsaved in the world are going “full speed ahead” in the direction of rebellion and open disregard of the Law of God.

And, yet, God would have them to repent – even unsaved people that are under the wrath of God. While they are under the wrath of God and during the time God is punishing them (which is going on in our day), God would still have them to repent. In other words, they are still responsible people that were created in the image of God and they have an obligation to obey God, even while they are suffering His wrath. We can know that because that was the situation with the Lord Jesus Christ. It says in Philippians 2:5-8:

Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus: Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God: But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.

Christ was obedient unto death, even the death of the cross, which was a shameful death. Of course, Christ was obedient from the point of the world’s foundation when He made actual payment for sin; Christ was obedient when He entered into the world in 7 BC and went to the cross in 33 AD to demonstrate (in a tableau) that He had already paid for sin at the world’s foundation. He was obedient in the Garden of Gethsemane when He began to be in agony, feeling the pangs of death, and He continued to be obedient all the way to the cross and all the while God was punishing Him, the Lord Jesus Christ was suffering. Remember that verse in Hebrews 5:8:

Though he were a Son, yet learned he obedience by the things which he suffered;

This means that as He suffered, He continued to obediently submit Himself to the will of God through the suffering. As He began to be judged, He faithfully endured the wrath of God through the judgment process. And that is what God would have mankind to do in the Day of Judgment – to submit to His wrath. It is not going to save them in any way, but it is what they are called to do by God.