We Need Jesus: The 7 Bowls of Revelation 16
The seven bowls of Revelation 16; image from Wikimedia Commons
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Are you struggling with Jesus right now?
Perhaps, right now, you are taking a first look at Christianity. Though it all looks quite nice, you don’t see compelling reasons why you should know Jesus, why you should commit to thinking and trying hard to find out who he truly is.
Or perhaps you grew up in a Christian home, and your parents’ worldliness and selfishness repel you and has put you off Jesus. “If that’s what it means to be a Christian, count me out.”
Or perhaps you are an older Christian who is struggling with complacency. “I’m a Christian disciple, but it’s more out of habit than living conviction. If I’m honest, I get more excited about a new series on Netflix, or a new donut shop downtown, than I do about knowing and loving Christ.”
There is a common element to these three struggles—the element of need. “Do I really need him?” “Why should I commit to knowing him?” “Why should I look past my parents’ Christianity-Lite?” “Why should I try to shrug off the smothering wet blanket of complacency?” “Do I need him?”
Revelation 16 shows that you do need Jesus. That you need him more than air.
Revelation 16 shows seven bowls of God’s fury poured out on humanity’s sin and rebellion. The bowls are tipped towards us right now, and already we feel the acid drips and splashes of his anger. At any moment they will be fully upended, and his total fury will cascade and crash upon us. These seven bowls are seven urgent reasons why we need the Savior Jesus Christ and the protection from God’s fury that only he can give.
Then I heard a loud voice from the temple telling the seven angels, “Go and pour out on the earth the seven bowls of the wrath of God” (Rev. 16:1).
As we examine the bowls, note how each one corresponds to the destruction of something made in Genesis 1-2 for the life and joy of God’s image bearers. Note also how each one corresponds to one of the ten Exodus plagues on Egypt. Egypt’s catastrophe shouts out, “If God brought such terrible plagues on sinful humanity before, then he can and will do it again. But this time, globally.”
The First Bowl — Loathsome Sores
So the first angel went and poured out his bowl on the earth, and harmful and painful sores came upon the people who bore the mark of the beast and worshiped its image (Rev. 16:2).
Here God’s fury is poured on humanity itself, created on the sixth day of Genesis 1. It corresponds to the sixth Egyptian plague of boils and falls on those who have received the 666 mark of the beast (Rev. 13:18), on those who have chosen to worship the creature above the Creator.
You need Jesus to protect you from this first bowl.
The Second Bowl — Seas of Blood
The second angel poured out his bowl into the sea, and it became like the blood of a corpse, and every living thing died that was in the sea (Rev. 16:3).
Here God’s fury pours out on the sea and its creatures. On the second day of creation God separated the waters above from the waters below in order to give humanity breathing space. The oceans also provide us with climate control, transport, and a thing of great beauty to wonder at and plunge into. On the fifth day God filled the waters with life, including fish as a marvelous source of food. God’s second bowl destroys the blessing of the ocean. This corresponds to the sixth plague, when God “slew” the waters of Egypt, making them a source of death.
You need Jesus to protect you from this second bowl.
The Third Bowl — Rivers of Blood
The third angel poured out his bowl into the rivers and the springs of water, and they became blood. And I heard the angel in charge of the waters say,
“Just are you, O Holy One, who is and who was,
for you brought these judgments.
For they have shed the blood of saints and prophets,
and you have given them blood to drink.
It is what they deserve!”
And I heard the altar saying,
“Yes, Lord God the Almighty,
true and just are your judgments!” (Rev. 16:4-7).
Here God’s fury is poured upon the rivers, whose creation is described in Genesis 2:6: “And a mist was going up from the land and was watering the whole face of the ground.” Rivers irrigate humanity’s crops and orchards and supply us with fresh drinking water.
This third bowl replicates the first plague on Egypt, when all her waterways were turned to blood. This punished Egypt for throwing the baby Hebrew boys into the Nile, as though God was saying, “You used the Nile as a tool of murder, and now I will make you see and even taste the blood of those innocents.”
Thus Revelation 16:6, “For they have shed the blood of saints and prophets, and you have given them blood to drink. It is what they deserve!” God’s judgments so often hand people over to what their sin craves and causes (Rom. 1:24-28).
You need Jesus to protect you from this third bowl.
The Fourth Bowl — Scorching Sun
The fourth angel poured out his bowl on the sun, and it was allowed to scorch people with fire. They were scorched by the fierce heat, and they cursed the name of God who had power over these plagues. They did not repent and give him glory (Rev. 16:8-9).
Here God’s fury is poured out on the sun, which was created with the moon on the fourth day, “the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night—and the stars” (Gen. 1:16). The sun, given for light and life, food and warmth, now becomes a tool of death.
Astronomers tell us that the sun is cooling and swelling, that in five billion years it will be a red giant that will swallow the inner planets: Mercury, Venus, and then Earth. Christ will indeed make the sun his tool of final judgment upon the wicked, though don't count on billions of years until that happens.
You need Jesus to protect you from this fourth bowl.
The Fifth Bowl — Darkness
The fifth angel poured out his bowl on the throne of the beast, and its kingdom was plunged into darkness. People gnawed their tongues in anguish and cursed the God of heaven for their pain and sores. They did not repent of their deeds (Rev. 16:10-11).
Instead of scorching the wicked to death, the sun is here snuffed out to them, entombing them in blackness. This corresponds to the penultimate plague upon Egypt, with a “darkness to be felt...in all the land of Egypt three days. They did not see one another, nor did anyone rise from his place for three days” (Exod. 10:21-23). It echoes Jesus’ description of hell, of people thrown “into the outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth” (Matt. 25:30).
Note also the perverse Pharaoh-like stubbornness of the rebellious heart. Though God must prevail, and his judgment is very terrible, our delusions of autonomy are so precious to us that we would rather spend an eternity in hell than give them up.
You need Jesus to protect you from this fifth bowl.
The Sixth Bowl — War Against Christ
The sixth angel poured out his bowl on the great river Euphrates, and its water was dried up, to prepare the way for the kings from the east. And I saw, coming out of the mouth of the dragon and out of the mouth of the beast and out of the mouth of the false prophet, three unclean spirits like frogs. For they are demonic spirits, performing signs, who go abroad to the kings of the whole world, to assemble them for battle on the great day of God the Almighty (Rev. 16:12-14).
This scene is set within Old Testament history. Rivers obstruct invading armies, and here God dries up the Euphrates, cradle of the Babylonian empire, to “prepare the way for the kings from the east.” It also evokes the horror of the second plague upon Pharaoh and Egypt:
“The Nile shall swarm with frogs that shall come up into your house and into your bedroom and on your bed and into the houses of your servants and your people, and into your ovens and your kneading bowls.” (Exod. 8:3)
The sixth bowl of God’s fury whips up satanic beings, resembling those frogs, to harangue worldly powers into rebellion against Christ (see Rev. 19:19).
Note carefully: warfare against Christ does not merely earn God’s judgment. It is God’s judgment. In judgment the Lord handed Pharaoh over to his doomed war against himself. Hell will be a perpetual war, a useless striving of the soul against God—of a wax party candle against a furnace, of a tissue against a typhoon, and full of anguish. People gnash their teeth in either agony or rage. In hell it will be both. A tantalizing historical precedent is then dropped.
And they assembled them at the place that in Hebrew is called Armageddon (Rev. 16:16).
Armageddon transliterates the Hebrew har megiddo, the Mountain of Megiddo. Megiddo was a Canaanite city, and 2 Kings 23:29-30 reports a great battle there, when good King Josiah was slain by Pharaoh Necho. Zechariah saw in Josiah’s death a shadow of Christ’s crucifixion:
“…when they look on me, on him whom they have pierced, they shall mourn for him, as one mourns for an only child, and weep bitterly over him, as one weeps over a firstborn.On that day the mourning in Jerusalem will be as great as the mourning for Hadad-rimmon in the plain of Megiddo” (Zech. 12:10-12).
In Judges, Megiddo was the site of the Lord’s victory over the evil Sisera. Deborah sang:
“The kings came, they fought;
then fought the kings of Canaan,
at Taanach, by the waters of Megiddo;
they got no spoils of silver.
From heaven the stars fought,
from their courses they fought against Sisera.” (Judg. 5:19-20)
“Armageddon,” therefore, represents the battle of evil against God, and evil’s destruction. This was the battle fought and won by Christ on the cross, who cancelled
“…the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross. He disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame, by triumphing over them in him. (Col. 2:14-15)
You need Jesus to protect you from this sixth bowl.
The Seventh Bowl — Final Fury
The seventh angel poured out his bowl into the air, and a loud voice came out of the temple, from the throne, saying, “It is done!” And there were flashes of lightning, rumblings, peals of thunder, and a great earthquake such as there had never been since man was on the earth, so great was that earthquake. The great city was split into three parts, and the cities of the nations fell, and God remembered Babylon the great, to make her drain the cup of the wine of the fury of his wrath. And every island fled away, and no mountains were to be found. And great hailstones, about one hundred pounds each, fell from heaven on people; and they cursed God for the plague of the hail, because the plague was so severe. (Rev. 16:17-21)
Six phenomena surrounding the seventh bowl show that this is humanity’s final doom: the voice from the temple crying, “It is done!”; an earthquake of unprecedented power; the total evisceration of “Babylon the great,” rebellion embodied; the final outpouring of the cup of God’s fury; creation, represented by islands and mountains, swept clean (prior to its redemption, Rom. 8:21); and a rain of 45 kilogram hailstones, the supreme amplification the seventh Egyptian plague.
Do you remember the final, final defeat of the evil and seemingly invincible T-1000 liquid-metal machine in Terminator 2: Judgment Day? Remember how it is destroyed, at last, in a vat of molten iron? After a frantic struggle—cue blood-curdling metallic screeches—it liquefies, its “face” dissolving into the lava.
That is indeed a representation of judgment day, a picture of rebellion and evil after the seven bowls of God’s wrath. Absolute, final, irreversible, and irredeemable dissolution and agony.
You need Jesus to protect you from this seventh bowl.
You need to be dressed in the righteousness of Jesus Christ.
Are you struggling with Jesus right now? With whether you really need him?
We need him seven times over, for the seven bowls of God’s fury are pouring out upon sin and evil, and we by nature are full of sin and evil! In Revelation 16 the sirens wail and the blood-red warning lights flash.
“Behold, I am coming like a thief! Blessed is the one who stays awake, keeping his garments on, that he may not go about naked and be seen exposed!” (Rev. 16:15)
Christ, like a thief in the night, will not pre-announce his return. Will you stand naked and exposed, wearing nothing but your sins, when those piercing eyes of fire gaze upon you, to determine your eternal place in either heaven or hell?
Be wide-awake, head and face washed in cold water, keen and ready for that final judgment. Be dressed in the rich white robe of Jesus’ perfect righteousness. His perfection.
May the seven bowls of God’s complete wrath drive us to seven-fold and complete dependence on God’s Son and Savior, Jesus Christ.
