Good evening and welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the Book of Revelation.  Tonight is study #15 of Revelation chapter 19 and we are going to be reading Revelation 19:11:

And I saw heaven opened, and behold a white horse; and he that sat upon him was called Faithful and True, and in righteousness he doth judge and make war.

We have been looking at this verse in our last couple of studies and we have seen that God is careful to show that His judgment is most just.  It is a righteous judgment and there is nothing unfair or wrong about the judgment of God, as the Lord determined to bring to pass a spiritual judgment.  It is a prolonged period of time in which He is not saving anyone else in the world and He is counting that as the punishment against the unsaved inhabitants of the earth.

Who is man that he can argue against God?  Who is man that he can find fault with God’s penalty for sin?  God is the Judge and He is the determiner of what justice is and what is satisfactory to the Law’s demand.  Man is not the determiner; that would be like a criminal that goes before the judge and he does not like the sentence passed down on him and he starts arguing with the judge, calling the judge unfair because the judge has sentenced him in a certain way.  Obviously, who is the criminal to talk against the judge?  He is the guilty one.  He is the one that has come before the law due to his transgression in breaking the law.  The judge has rightly looked at his case, found him guilty and pronounced the sentence and the criminal may not like it.  The criminal rarely, if ever, likes the sentence a judge passes upon him and that is how it is with mankind when people hear that God has shut the door to heaven.  He has ended His salvation program and He is no longer saving people.  Some want to justify themselves and argue with the Judge and find fault with the sentence.  They look closely to try to find an area in which they can accuse or charge God of wrongdoing, but there is none.  It is a righteous judgment of God.

It is just like when God brought judgment upon the churches and congregations during the Great Tribulation period for 23 years.  For them, He shut the door of heaven and ended His salvation program there.  The people within the congregations included entire families and in many cases there were children born into these church families during this 23-year period and they could not become saved.  Their parents kept them there and some of these children that resided within the corporate body even died during that time from 1988 to 2011.  They may have been age 2 or age 5 or age 10 and they never left the church.  Others just grew up within the churches and stayed there, never venturing out of the churches, but it was outside of the churches in the world that God was saving a great multitude during the Latter Rain as He evangelized the earth during the (about) last 17 years of that Great Tribulation. 

No matter how you want to look at it, the fact is that the Holy Spirit was not in the midst of the congregations and, therefore, no one could have become saved while a part of the churches and, unfortunately, that applied to children, whether they were toddlers or newborn or babies in the womb.  They were considered to be part of the churches and that is why God said, in Matthew 24, “And woe unto them that are with child, and to them that give suck in those days!” because it was such a sorrowful thing.  It was such a pitiful thing that these poor children were in the place where God’s Spirit was not operating to save anyone.  It was only if the parents came out of the congregation or the children left for some reason and they could be outside of the churches that God’s spirit could work to save them.  Yet, God is a just Judge and mankind is sinners: “For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God,” and all are, therefore, guilty.  They are born and conceived in sin because you cannot bring the clean from the unclean.  So if two parents get together, spiritually, it is two unclean people that conceived the child and that child is born unclean in sin, as King David was moved to write in Psalm 51.  The child is born in sin and the Bible says, “They go astray as soon as they be born, speaking lies.”  They are born in rebellion against God and they are born rebels.  It is just like when two snakes get together and a baby snake is born.  That baby snake is still a snake.  When two people get together and have a child, that little baby is a sinner and that is how God views mankind.  

God had a program to evangelize the world to save His elect only.  That is it.  It was never a program to comfort all the unsaved, the non-elect, or to offer some sort of psychological wellbeing for them, where they could be comfortable and relaxed as they went about their sinful pursuits knowing it would always be the “day of salvation” if they should ever want to go to God.  Is that not a comfort to the sinners of the world?  God was never concerned with that.  It was never His intention that the saving Gospel be a “psychological tool” or a safety net in case a man ever tired of his iniquity. 

God had a plan to save His elect and He carried out that plan down through time.  He saved just a few in the Old Testament days.  He saved more during the church age and He saved a great multitude during the second part of the Great Tribulation, saving “the best until last,” and then He completed His salvation program and brought judgment upon all the sinners.  The unsaved people that were alive heard the worldwide proclamation that Judgment Day was approaching on May 21, 2011, and there was a great need for them to go to God and beseech Him for mercy before that day arrived.  If they did not become saved, then God did judge all of them, but, likewise, all those born after the door was shut are seen as sinners that are born; He sees them as conceived in sin and born speaking lies and they are all rebels.  So the judgment sits upon all unsaved mankind in the earth.  It is a righteous judgment of God against sin and against those that have rebelled against Him and they have no Saviour.  That is the judgment that God has brought upon the world.

So, again, God says in Revelation 19:11:

… and in righteousness he doth judge and make war.

Here, God reveals that Judgment Day is a time of “war.”  The Greek word translated as “war” can also be translated as “battle.”  For instance, it says in Revelation 16:14:

For they are the spirits of devils, working miracles, which go forth unto the kings of the earth and of the whole world, to gather them to the battle of that great day of God Almighty.

The word “battle” is the same word translated as “war” in our verse.  This is the same battle we read of in Revelation 20:7:

And when the thousand years are expired, Satan shall be loosed out of his prison,

Remember the “thousand years” is a figure that represents the 1,955 years of the church age, so the timing here is the beginning of the Great Tribulation.  Satan is loosed out of his prison and the Great Tribulation begins.  Then it goes on to say in Revelation 20:8:

And shall go out to deceive the nations which are in the four quarters of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together to battle: the number of whom is as the sand of the sea.

Satan is loosed.  He began to rule over both the nations and the churches in an unprecedented manner and in this way he was gathering together his forces for the battle that was coming.  Actually, there has already been a “battle.”

When the Bible speaks of a “battle” or a “war” there are a few possibilities that could be in view and it is the context which determines of which “battle” or “war” God is speaking.  For instance, it says in Revelation 12:7:

And there was war in heaven: Michael and his angels fought against the dragon; and the dragon fought and his angels,

This “war” was taking place at the time of the cross.  “Michael” is another name for Christ and when Christ went to the cross, it was a death blow against Satan in that battle.  Satan was judged by being cast out of heaven and he was brought into the condition of “hell” and he was bound for a figurative thousand years in the bottomless pit; he could not stop God’s plan to evangelize the world through the churches during the church age.  That means there was a “battle” or “war” in 33 AD.

There was also a battle throughout the almost 2,000 years of the church age.  It says in Revelation 12:17:

And the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ.

Here, the context shows this was after there was “war” in heaven and Satan was cast into the earth.  He was then wroth with the “woman” that brought forth the man child.  The “woman” is the body of believers.  Satan made war with the remnant of her seed and that would be the elect that could be found in the churches through the many centuries of the church age.  There was constant warfare and the battle raged.  Remember, we read in Revelation, chapter 6, of Christ on a white horse going forth to conquer as He sent forth the Gospel into the world.  Satan is pictured as the rider on the red horse that went forth after Him trying to take peace from the earth.  Christ was sowing the seed and Satan was attempting to snatch it away.  Christ came to deliver His elect out of the kingdom of darkness and Satan did everything in his power to prevent it and to fight against the Gospel that could deliver souls.  Therefore, Satan attempted to pervert the Gospel and change it into something else and he attempted to turn faithful churches into unfaithful churches.  That was the battleground for 1,955 years and certain churches fell and became synagogues of Satan, but other churches remained reasonably faithful.  However, Christ did accomplish His purpose of saving the “firstfruits,” which the Bible also calls the “144,000.”

Then came the end of the church age and the end of that battle, but the beginning of yet another battle, as we read of the two witnesses in Revelation 11:7:

And when they shall have finished their testimony, the beast that ascendeth out of the bottomless pit shall make war against them, and shall overcome them, and kill them.

The beast is Satan and he ascended out of the bottomless pit, where he had been cast after the earlier battle at the cross.  He had suffered a death blow and he was bound for a “thousand years.”  But now the battle landscape has changed and Satan is ascending from the bottomless pits to make war against the two witnesses and overcome them and kill them.  Who will win the battle?  This is the beginning of the judgment on the churches at the end of the church age and the beginning of the Great Tribulation.  Satan is initially winning the battle.  It appeared he had won.  It says of the beast (Satan) in Revelation 13:7:

And it was given unto him to make war with the saints, and to overcome them: and power was given him over all kindreds, and tongues, and nations.

Satan made war with the saints and overcame them.  It is not the time of the cross.  It is not the church age.  It is at the end of the church age when it appears that Satan has finally won the war, as his “deadly wound was healed” and all the world wondered at the beast.  It was the time from 1988 to 2011, the 23 years of the Great Tribulation, when the world was rejoicing that the “two witnesses” (the witness of God’s Word within the churches) are now “dead.”  The world is making merry and iniquity is abounding.  The churches are completely unfaithful and apostate and Satan has taken his seat as the man of sin to rule in the congregations because he won the “war.”  He won the “battle” at the beginning of Judgment Day, as judgment began at the house of God, according to 1Peter 4:17, and it certainly looked as if Satan had won the final battle.

But it was not the final battle.  God had one more battle in mind and that would be at the end of the Great Tribulation.  It would come at the end of the Latter Rain and the end of God’s salvation program when God had saved all those whose names were written in the Lamb’s Book of Life.  Therefore, we read about that final battle in Revelation, chapter 17.  In the previous verses in this chapter, Satan had been victorious during the Great Tribulation, but then it says in Revelation 17:14:

These shall make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb shall overcome them: for he is Lord of lords, and King of kings: and they that are with him are called, and chosen, and faithful.

Here it is.  It is now the end of the Great Tribulation and it is the Day of Judgment on the entire world.  The Lamb is doing “battle” because Satan had dared to rise up against Christ to make war against Him.  And, of course, the Lamb overcomes Satan and his forces; Gog and Magog are defeated and Satan is deposed.  All the corporate churches had been bound in bundles as the tares for burning at the beginning of the Day of Judgment, leaving those unsaved outside of the churches to be destroyed over the course of the prolonged period of judgment.  So the final battle took place on May 21, 2011 and the effects of that battle are being carried out over this prolonged period of Judgment Day.

Notice that is said, “And they that are with him are called, and chosen, and faithful.”  Of course, this can only refer to the elect: “For many are called, but few are chosen,” and they are the faithful ones because their faith is the faith of Christ.  They are with Him in the battle and we will see that in even greater detail as we continue in chapter 19.

But now, let us go back to Revelation 9 when the “locusts” came into view and the sun and air had been darkened by reason of the smoke of the pit.  The locusts came out of the smoke at the beginning of Judgment Day and that was the time when Satan and his forces were defeated.  It is another confirmation that the victorious “locusts” have nothing to do with Satan, false prophets or anything like that – get that out of your mind, if you are thinking that way.  They are the saints and they are the ones with the Lamb.  They are the “called, and chosen, and faithful.”  It says in Revelation 9:5:

And to them it was given that they should not kill them, but that they should be tormented five months: and their torment was as the torment of a scorpion, when he striketh a man.

Then it says in Revelation 9:7-11:

And the shapes of the locusts were like unto horses prepared unto battle; and on their heads were as it were crowns like gold, and their faces were as the faces of men. And they had hair as the hair of women, and their teeth were as the teeth of lions. And they had breastplates, as it were breastplates of iron; and the sound of their wings was as the sound of chariots of many horses running to battle. And they had tails like unto scorpions, and there were stings in their tails: and their power was to hurt men five months. And they had a king over them, which is the angel of the bottomless pit, whose name in the Hebrew tongue is Abaddon, but in the Greek tongue hath his name Apollyon.

Here is a picture of the saints, typified by locusts, and of Christ, the king over them.  His name is Abaddon or Apollyon, which means “destruction.”  It is the time for God to destroy the rebels, so He takes upon Himself the name “Abaddon” or “destruction.”  It is Christ ruling with a “rod of iron” and not for the benefit of (unsaved) men, but to destroy them.  The locusts are said to be like “many horses running to battle” because it is the day of wrath and the day of the final war between the kingdom of God and the kingdom of Satan.

Of course, Revelation 9 is a commentary on Joel, chapter 2, which is also describing Judgment Day and speaking of God’s army, the elect.  God describes them this way in Joel 2:4-11:

The appearance of them is as the appearance of horses; and as horsemen, so shall they run. Like the noise of chariots on the tops of mountains shall they leap, like the noise of a flame of fire that devoureth the stubble, as a strong people set in battle array. Before their face the people shall be much pained: all faces shall gather blackness. They shall run like mighty men; they shall climb the wall like men of war; and they shall march every one on his ways, and they shall not break their ranks: Neither shall one thrust another; they shall walk every one in his path: and when they fall upon the sword, they shall not be wounded. They shall run to and fro in the city; they shall run upon the wall, they shall climb up upon the houses; they shall enter in at the windows like a thief. The earth shall quake before them; the heavens shall tremble: the sun and the moon shall be dark, and the stars shall withdraw their shining: And JEHOVAH shall utter his voice before his army: for his camp is very great: for he is strong that executeth his word: for the day of JEHOVAH is great and very terrible; and who can abide it?

Here, God is going before His army.  It is the Lamb and His “called, and chosen, and faithful.”  It is Christ with “ten thousands of his saints.”  It is the Word of God seated upon a white horse and all the armies of heaven following Him on their white horses.  It is the “locusts” that have a king over them called “Abaddon” or “destruction.”

In so many places, God is teaching the same truth.  Judgment Day is a war and God wins the war and His people are with Him: “Know ye not that the saints shall judge the world?”  This is the question God asks in 1Corinthians, chapter 6.  In all these verses, He is providing the answer.  Yes, the people of God are active and involved with Christ in the day of battle.