We come to the beginning of the end – again we see adaptations of the Egyptian plagues from the Exodus. However, these judgements are directed at the followers of the beast and the judgements affect the whole earth, not just a third of it. For instance, in Revelation 8:7,8 only one-third of the earth and sea is affected, but now the whole water supply is turned to blood (vs 3,4).

In this passage God’s final judgement shows the final binding and defeat of Satan and his forces – those who have revealed their true loyalty to the beast (v 5). The angels pour out the bowls of God’s wrath upon the earth (v 2), the sea (v 3), the rivers (v 4) and the sun (v 8). Then the beast’s kingdom is plunged into darkness (v 10). 

The judgement also is an attempt to elicit repentance (vs 9b,11b). How are people’s reactions to the bowl plagues like Pharaoh’s reaction to the plagues of Egypt?

Martin Luther King wrote that God ‘… is working through history for the salvation of his children … Evil dies on the seashore, not merely because of man’s endless struggle against it, but because of God’s power to defeat it.’*

*Martin Luther King Jr, ‘The Death of Evil upon the Seashore’, in Strength to Love, Harper and Row, 1963, p64  

‘He is the Rock, his works are perfect, and all his ways are just. A faithful God who does no wrong, upright and just is he.’¹ 

In this chapter, we are further plunged into some of the most challenging images of judgement in the Bible. This is not a prediction of future vindictive acts by an angry deity; we have seen earlier in the book that John appears to be describing the world he is living in, not a future apocalyptic age. There is no reason to think these are literal: they are not literally possible, and we have been happy to recognise the symbolic meaning of the other images in the book.

We also need to recognise that the language here closely matches two other descriptions of God’s judgement in the Bible. The first is the ten plagues that come on the nation of Egypt,² which God sends in response to Pharoah’s refusal to ‘Let my people go’.³ We thus find mention of blood, hail, boils, darkness and frogs, all from the Exodus account, and it is this close correspondence which makes this sequence different from the seals and the trumpets. The other parallel is with the teaching of Jesus. The language of gnawing their tongues and cursing in verses 10 and 11 comes very close to Jesus’ repeated mention in Matthew’s Gospel of ‘outer darkness’, where there is ‘weeping and gnashing of teeth’.⁴ 

Central to this sequence is the interlude in verses 5–7; it is almost as if the agents involved anticipate our objections and pause the action to offer a commentary. The central principle of God’s judgements is that they are ‘true and just ’ (v 7); God is giving to people what they have given to others (the principle of lex talionis) and is following the consequences of what they have chosen. If we interpret God’s judgements in any other way, we have missed the point.

Do I struggle with the idea of God acting with this kind of justice? Why (not)? To whom in the world today will this teaching be important?

¹ Deut 32:4  ² Exod 7–11  ³ Exod 5:1  ⁴ Matt 8:12; 22:13; 25:30, AV