Revelation 9:20 –
But the people who did not die in these plagues still refused to repent of their evil deeds and turn to God. They continued to worship demons and idols made of gold, silver, bronze, stone, and wood—idols that can neither see nor hear nor walk!
The fifth and sixth angels blew their trumpets and brought their terrors to the earth. The fifth one for 5 months brought locusts who stung like scorpions and did not sting the ones with seals on their foreheads. If we go back these are the 144,000 servants of the Lord. Then the sixth one brought 4 horsemen and three plagues which either killed 1/3 of the people on earth or injured them with their tails. So as you read the trumpet blasts went from discomfort to personal pain quickly.
Now the one thing I find interesting is even through all this this verse implies there is still time to repent of your sins and turn to God. Yet even after seeing all this people still held to the idols and continued to ignore God. Even as followers of God how many of us do this? We believe and maybe have experienced God first hand, yet we still hold onto our life here on earth. We may not worship idols like Baal, but today our idols are Mercedes, Porsche and Rolls. Instead of looking to something seen to explain the unseen, we dismiss anything “odd” as coincidence or probable events.
No our focus these days becomes inward and more scientific bound than amazed with the glory of God. Our worship is more on things or prideful ambition than towards a living, yet unseen, God. Sure everyone says if God would show himself today than I would have reason to believe, but the scripture as for faith and not solid proof like Thomas demanded.
Yesterday we studied what it means to follow God and be his disciple, not just a “believer” or a “Christian”. Pastor Miles used Luke 9:57 – 62 as an example of three who wanted in to the kingdom yet still held on to this world. During the teaching, he talked about a young man who had a bunch going on in him and wanted to be saved. When Miles gave him the steps he realized if he did this his weekend would be much different than he planned, so he put it off. Miles did his funeral after a drug overdose. Maybe this is what these “revelations” are teaching us, is not about end times but about our frailty and inability to predict when the next drunk will swerve into our lane. This is far more important than just a thing to do Sunday morning; it’s your eternal existence. Peace or torment? Your choice!