Good evening and welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the Book of Revelation.  Tonight is study #26 of Revelation, chapter 18, and we are going to read Revelation 18:11-16:

And the merchants of the earth shall weep and mourn over her; for no man buyeth their merchandise any more: The merchandise of gold, and silver, and precious stones, and of pearls, and fine linen, and purple, and silk, and scarlet, and all thyine wood, and all manner vessels of ivory, and all manner vessels of most precious wood, and of brass, and iron, and marble, And cinnamon, and odours, and ointments, and frankincense, and wine, and oil, and fine flour, and wheat, and beasts, and sheep, and horses, and chariots, and slaves, and souls of men. And the fruits that thy soul lusted after are departed from thee, and all things which were dainty and goodly are departed from thee, and thou shalt find them no more at all. The merchants of these things, which were made rich by her, shall stand afar off for the fear of her torment, weeping and wailing, And saying, Alas, alas, that great city, that was clothed in fine linen, and purple, and scarlet, and decked with gold, and precious stones, and pearls!

I will stop reading there.  God is describing the final judgment of mankind and He typifies it through the city of Babylon and He pictures the riches of her kingdom, which would be the riches of this world.  God looks at it as if the unsaved people of the world are seeing their riches disappear; they are witnessing their wealth going from them: “And the fruits that thy soul lusted after are departed from thee, and all things which were dainty and goodly are departed from thee, and thou shalt find them no more at all.” 

In verses 12 and 13 God lists 28 items, beginning with gold and silver and precious stones and concluding with horses, chariots, slaves and souls of men.  The number “28” breaks down to “4 x7” and the number “4” represents the universality or worldwide nature of the loss of the riches of this world and the number “7” points to completion, so it is the complete perfection of all things for Babylon.  This would relate to physical things or to the evil treasures that men store in their hearts, rather than storing up the things of heaven.  They are the sins of mankind as he pursues the pleasures of sin for a season. 

Since the churches have become part of Babylon and a province of Satan when he conquered them and they came under his rule, we also have a reference to spiritual things such as “souls of men.”  All is lost – everything that man has obtained or desired to have and all the things they lusted after that were a part of this world.  It is all gone from them by the conclusion of the day of the Lord, which is Judgment Day.  It is done in “one day.”  Remember May 21, 2011 began Judgment Day and October 7, 2015 will very likely conclude Judgment Day.  Finally, at the conclusion of this time, if we are correct, October 7, 2015 will culminate in the destruction of the entire world and the burning up of all things and the loss of unsaved mankind’s inheritance.  He wasted his inheritance as he treasured up evil in this world.  He consumed it upon his lusts and now it is gone from him, even his own soul; man will lose his own soul.  That is what Jesus said in Matthew 16:24-27:

Then said Jesus unto his disciples, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it. For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul? For the Son of man shall come in the glory of his Father with his angels; and then he shall reward every man according to his works.

In our passage in Revelation, chapter 18, the merchants of the earth are mourning and weeping because no man buys their merchandise any more, including the merchandise of the “souls of men.”  There is a similar passage in the Book of Ezekiel, chapter 27.  If you remember, we went back to Ezekiel, chapters 27 and 28, a couple of times because “Tyrus” is a type and figure God uses of mankind and there was similar language between the destruction of Tyrus and the destruction of Babylon because Babylon also represents the kingdom of Satan and the unsaved people of the earth.  In Ezekiel 27 God describes the destruction of Tyrus and He says in Ezekiel 27:27-34:

Thy riches, and thy fairs, thy merchandise, thy mariners, and thy pilots, thy calkers, and the occupiers of thy merchandise, and all thy men of war, that are in thee, and in all thy company which is in the midst of thee, shall fall into the midst of the seas in the day of thy ruin. The suburbs shall shake at the sound of the cry of thy pilots. And all that handle the oar, the mariners, and all the pilots of the sea, shall come down from their ships, they shall stand upon the land; And shall cause their voice to be heard against thee, and shall cry bitterly, and shall cast up dust upon their heads, they shall wallow themselves in the ashes: And they shall make themselves utterly bald for thee, and gird them with sackcloth, and they shall weep for thee with bitterness of heart and bitter wailing. And in their wailing they shall take up a lamentation for thee, and lament over thee, saying, What city is like Tyrus, like the destroyed in the midst of the sea? When thy wares went forth out of the seas, thou filledst many people; thou didst enrich the kings of the earth with the multitude of thy riches and of thy merchandise. In the time when thou shalt be broken by the seas in the depths of the waters thy merchandise and all thy company in the midst of thee shall fall.

I will stop reading there.  Here, God is using another figure, but He is really teaching the same thing as we are reading about in Revelation, chapter 18, regarding Babylon.  Here, it is Tyrus that is destroyed and the Lord describes the day of Tyrus’ ruin and notice that the loss of her riches is lamented and there is bitter crying.  The Hebrew word translated as “bitterly” in verse 30 and as “bitterness” and “bitter” in verse 31 is the same word used in speaking of Esau in Genesis, chapter 27.  This is the point in time when Esau discovered that the blessing had been given to his twin brother Jacob, rather than to him, and there is no more blessing.  It says in Genesis 27:34:

And when Esau heard the words of his father, he cried with a great and exceeding bitter cry, and said unto his father, Bless me, even me also, O my father.

At the point when Esau learns he will not be blessed, there is “bitter” crying and that ties in to the end of salvation in the Day of Judgment, as God shut the door of heaven.  And God did this after finalizing the blessing of spiritual Jacob, or all the elect.  All the elect have received the blessing of salvation, everyone whose name was written in the Lamb’s Book of Life; they have all been found and God’s Word has been applied to their hearts and all to become saved have been saved.  Therefore, the blessing by the Father (typified by Isaac) has been given to the elect and then God shut the door.  There is no more blessing for the rest of unsaved mankind, as typified by Esau, even though we are all brothers, are we not?  We all come from Adam.  But there is no more blessing because the blessing has been bestowed upon the elect and there is “bitter” weeping and crying at that point and this is also in view in Revelation 18 as the unsaved are mourning and weeping and crying, “Woe, woe,” at the loss of their blessing.  They have lost the blessing of God.

The word “bitter” is also used in Zephaniah, chapter 1, which is a chapter that goes into depth to discuss Judgment Day, the day of the Lord.  It says in Zephaniah 1:14:

The great day of JEHOVAH is near, it is near, and hasteth greatly, even the voice of the day of JEHOVAH: the mighty man shall cry there bitterly.

Again, it is the crying of the kings of the earth and the merchants of the earth and Revelation 18 will go on to describe the shipmasters and all the companies in ships and sailors, just as Ezekiel 27 speaks of mariners and shipmen.  They are crying bitterly because it is the end of God’s salvation program; there is no more blessing and no matter how man strives to receive the blessing through tears, it is not there.  Hebrews, chapter 12 tells us that this was what Esau was trying to do, as it tells us in Hebrews 12:15-17:

Looking diligently lest any man fail of the grace of God; lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you, and thereby many be defiled; Lest there be any fornicator, or profane person, as Esau, who for one morsel of meat sold his birthright. For ye know how that afterward, when he would have inherited the blessing, he was rejected: for he found no place of repentance, though he sought it carefully with tears.

Esau’s tears were “calculated tears,” as he tried to play on the sympathy of his father.  We all have to admit that we did this when we were children; children are able to manipulate their mother or father.  Yet, God has very purposefully recorded Esau’s weeping and his “bitter” cry in order to attempt to effect a change in his father’s blessing, but his father could not change it.  It was out of his hands once the blessing was given.  Likewise, the Bible tells us that once God had shut the door, there would be those that would come knocking: “Lord, Lord, open to us!”  The Bible tells us that at the same time there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.  There is very purposeful weeping going on that is designed to attempt to change the will of God concerning his action in shutting the door of heaven and, yet, there is no opening of the door.  There cannot be and the door will not be opened ever again. 

Certainly God’s people that are alive and living on the earth hear a form of this weeping as they hear some people fighting against the doctrine of the end of salvation and the Lord having shut the door to heaven.  They play on sympathies and they bring up one sorrowful fact after another: “What about the children?  How can it be?”  It is the equivalent of weeping in an attempt to get the door open.  It is the equivalent of Esau shedding tears in an attempt to get his father to bestow a blessing.  Yet, nothing can alter what God has done: “What God has shut, no man can open.”  God has shut the door to heaven and there cannot be the opening of it.

So, we are reading in Revelation 18 of the tremendous sorrow and the grievous nature of Judgment Day.  It is not as awful as men had imagined and church theologians have put forth and wrote in the doctrines of their congregations – such doctrines as the doctrine of “hell” for evermore, where people will be punished and tormented without end for ever and ever in an awful place of burning.  Thankfully, God is too kind and good for that sort of punishment.  He cannot punish above what His law decrees and His Law decrees that one cannot give more than “forty stripes,” so there is a limit to His punishment.  Nonetheless, it is a sorrowful and tragic time for the world because it is the day of punishment, the day of the wrath of God and this means there are some “hard truths” that the Bible does declare and God’s people must share them faithfully, which is that God has concluded His salvation program.

The loss of the merchandise and all the things God lists are basically summarized in Revelation 18:14:

And the fruits that thy soul lusted after are departed from thee, and all things which were dainty and goodly are departed from thee, and thou shalt find them no more at all.

The Greek word translated as “fruits” is only found in this verse.  Also, the Greek word for “dainty” is only found in this verse.  When that happens and because we follow the Bible’s methodology of comparing Scripture with Scripture, it makes it much more difficult to understand what the Lord is saying here.  But the word “goodly” is Strong’s #2986 and it is found several other places in the Bible.  We are going to look at just one of these in the next chapter.  Speaking of the “bride of Christ,” the elect, it says in Revelation 19:8:

And to her was granted that she should be arrayed in fine linen, clean and white: for the fine linen is the righteousness of saints.

The word “white” is the word translated as “goodly.”  Going back to our verse in Revelation 18:14, it says, “and all things which were dainty” or which were “white.”  Also included in the list of merchandise of Babylon, it says in Revelation 18:12: “The merchandise of gold, and silver, and precious stones, and of pearls, and fine linen.”  So we have “fine linen” associated with merchandise in Revelation 19:8.  Actually, it is a very closely related word (Strong’s #1039 and #1040) and is basically the same word.  Here, God is saying that things which were “dainty” and “white” are departed from thee and “thou shalt find them no more at all.” 

God is using the figures of the kings of the earth, the merchants of the earth and the shipmasters as an illustration of mankind and as if they are seeing this happen, on the one hand.  If they could see with spiritual eyes and if they could understand what God has done, then there would be this sort of recognition of the removal of God’s salvation program.  His salvation program was first in the churches and congregations, but God removed it from them.  Then salvation took place outside of the churches when God evangelized the world with the Latter Rain and saved the great multitude, but once Judgment Day came the evangelization of the nations also ceased and the Gospel of the Bible no longer turns “sinners to saints.”  It no longer cleanses the “filthy” and makes them righteous and it no longer clothes the “naked” with clean, white linen.  It is gone from them.  They no longer have any hope of dealing in that kind of merchandise because it is not a part of this world any longer.  It is a final ending of the Gospel of salvation because it is departed from Babylon (this world) and it will no more be found.