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Chapter 41
Desolation of the Earth
"HER sins have reached unto heaven, and God hath remembered her iniquities. . . . In
the cup which she hath filled fill to her double. How much she hath glorified herself, and
lived deliciously, so much torment and sorrow give her: for she saith in her heart, I sit
a queen, and am no widow, and shall see no sorrow. Therefore shall her plagues come in one
day, death, and mourning, and famine; and she shall be utterly burned with fire: for
strong is the Lord God who judgeth her. And the kings of the earth, who have committed
fornication and lived deliciously with her, shall bewail her, and lament for her, . . .
saying, Alas, alas that great city Babylon, that mighty city! for in one hour is thy
judgment come." Revelation 18:5-10.
"The merchants of the earth," that have "waxed rich through the abundance
of her delicacies," "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! For in one
hour so great riches is come to nought." Revelation 18:11, 3, 15-17.
Such are the judgments that fall upon Babylon in the day of the visitation of God's wrath.
She has filled up the measure of her iniquity; her time has come; she is ripe for
destruction.
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When the voice of God turns the captivity of His people, there is a terrible awakening of
those who have lost all in the great conflict of life. While probation continued they were
blinded by Satan's deceptions, and they justified their course of sin. The rich prided
themselves upon their superiority to those who were less favored; but they had obtained
their riches by violation of the law of God. They had neglected to feed the hungry, to
clothe the naked, to deal justly, and to love mercy. They had sought to exalt themselves
and to obtain the homage of their fellow creatures. Now they are stripped of all that made
them great and are left destitute and defenseless. They look with terror upon the
destruction of the idols which they preferred before their Maker. They have sold their
souls for earthly riches and enjoyments, and have not sought to become rich toward God.
The result is, their lives are a failure; their pleasures are now turned to gall, their
treasures to corruption. The gain of a lifetime is swept away in a moment. The rich bemoan
the destruction of their grand houses, the scattering of their gold and silver. But their
lamentations are silenced by the fear that they themselves are to perish with their idols.
The wicked are filled with regret, not because of their sinful neglect of God and their
fellow men, but because God has conquered. They lament that the result is what it is; but
they do not repent of their wickedness. They would leave no means untried to conquer if
they could.
The world see the very class whom they have mocked and derided, and desired to
exterminate, pass unharmed through pestilence, tempest, and earthquake. He who is to the
transgressors of His law a devouring fire, is to His people a safe pavilion.
The minister who has sacrificed truth to gain the favor of men now discerns the character
and influence of his teachings. It is apparent that the omniscient eye was following him
as he stood in the desk, as he walked the streets, as he mingled with men in the various
scenes of life. Every
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emotion of the soul, every line written, every word uttered, every act that led men to
rest in a refuge of falsehood, has been scattering seed; and now, in the wretched, lost
souls around him, he beholds the harvest.
Saith the Lord: "They have healed the hurt of the daughter of My people slightly,
saying, Peace, peace; when there is no peace." "With lies ye have made the heart
of the righteous sad, whom I have not made sad; and strengthened the hands of the wicked,
that he should not return from his wicked way, by promising him life." Jeremiah 8:11;
Ezekiel 13:22.
"Woe be unto the pastors that destroy and scatter the sheep of My pasture! . . .
Behold, I will visit upon you the evil of your doings." "Howl, ye shepherds, and
cry; and wallow yourselves in the ashes, ye principal of the flock: for your days for
slaughter and of your dispersions are accomplished; . . . and the shepherds shall have no
way to flee, nor the principal of the flock to escape." Jeremiah 23:1, 2; 25:34, 35,
margin.
Ministers and people see that they have not sustained the right relation to God. They see
that they have rebelled against the Author of all just and righteous law. The setting
aside of the divine precepts gave rise to thousands of springs of evil, discord, hatred,
iniquity, until the earth became one vast field of strife, one sink of corruption. This is
the view that now appears to those who rejected truth and chose to cherish error. No
language can express the longing which the disobedient and disloyal feel for that which
they have lost forever--eternal life. Men whom the world has worshiped for their talents
and eloquence now see these things in their true light. They realize what they have
forfeited by transgression, and they fall at the feet of those whose fidelity they have
despised and derided, and confess that God has loved them.
The people see that they have been deluded. They accuse one another of having led them to
destruction; but all unite in heaping their bitterest condemnation upon the ministers.
Unfaithful pastors have prophesied smooth things; they have led their hearers to make void
the law of God and to
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persecute those who would keep it holy. Now, in their despair, these teachers confess
before the world their work of deception. The multitudes are filled with fury. "We
are lost!" they cry, "and you are the cause of our ruin;" and they turn
upon the false shepherds. The very ones that once admired them most will pronounce the
most dreadful curses upon them. The very hands that once crowned them with laurels will be
raised for their destruction. The swords which were to slay God's people are now employed
to destroy their enemies. Everywhere there is strife and bloodshed.
"A noise shall come even to the ends of the earth; for the Lord hath a controversy
with the nations, He will plead with all flesh; He will give them that are wicked to the
sword." Jeremiah 25:31. For six thousand years the great controversy has been in
progress; the Son of God and His heavenly messengers have been in conflict with the power
of the evil one, to warn, enlighten, and save the children of men. Now all have made their
decisions; the wicked have fully united with Satan in his warfare against God. The time
has come for God to vindicate the authority of His downtrodden law. Now the controversy is
not alone with Satan, but with men. "The Lord hath a controversy with the
nations;" "He will give them that are wicked to the sword."
The mark of deliverance has been set upon those "that sigh and that cry for all the
abominations that be done." Now the angel of death goes forth, represented in
Ezekiel's vision by the men with the slaughtering weapons, to whom the command is given:
"Slay utterly old and young, both maids, and little children, and women: but come not
near any man upon whom is the mark; and begin at My sanctuary." Says the prophet:
"They began at the ancient men which were before the house." Ezekiel 9:1-6. The
work of destruction begins among those who have professed to be the spiritual guardians of
the people. The false watchmen are the first to fall. There are none to pity or to spare.
Men, women, maidens, and little children perish together.
"The Lord cometh out of His place to punish the inhabitants
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of the earth for their iniquity: the earth also shall disclose her blood, and shall no
more cover her slain." Isaiah 26:21. "And this shall be the plague wherewith the
Lord will smite all the people that have fought against Jerusalem; Their flesh shall
consume away while they stand upon their feet, and their eyes shall consume away in their
holes, and their tongue shall consume away in their mouth. And it shall come to pass in
that day, that a great tumult from the Lord shall be among them; and they shall lay hold
everyone on the hand of his neighbor, and his hand shall rise up against the hand of his
neighbor." Zechariah 14:12, 13. In the mad strife of their own fierce passions, and
by the awful outpouring of God's unmingled wrath, fall the wicked inhabitants of the
earth--priests, rulers, and people, rich and poor, high and low. "And the slain of
the Lord shall be at that day from one end of the earth even unto the other end of the
earth: they shall not be lamented, neither gathered, nor buried." Jeremiah 25:33.
At the coming of Christ the wicked are blotted from the face of the whole earth--consumed
with the spirit of His mouth and destroyed by the brightness of His glory. Christ takes
His people to the City of God, and the earth is emptied of its inhabitants. "Behold,
the Lord maketh the earth empty, and maketh it waste, and turneth it upside down, and
scattereth abroad the inhabitants thereof." "The land shall be utterly emptied,
and utterly spoiled: for the Lord hath spoken this word." "Because they have
transgressed the laws, changed the ordinance, broken the everlasting covenant. Therefore
hath the curse devoured the earth, and they that dwell therein are desolate: therefore the
inhabitants of the earth are burned." Isaiah 24:1, 3, 5, 6.
The whole earth appears like a desolate wilderness. The ruins of cities and villages
destroyed by the earthquake, uprooted trees, ragged rocks thrown out by the sea or torn
out of the earth itself, are scattered over its surface, while vast caverns mark the spot
where the mountains have been rent from their foundations.
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Now the event takes place foreshadowed in the last solemn service of the Day of Atonement.
When the ministration in the holy of holies had been completed, and the sins of Israel had
been removed from the sanctuary by virtue of the blood of the sin offering, then the
scapegoat was presented alive before the Lord; and in the presence of the congregation the
high priest confessed over him "all the iniquities of the children of Israel, and all
their transgressions in all their sins, putting them upon the head of the goat."
Leviticus 16:21. In like manner, when the work of atonement in the heavenly sanctuary has
been completed, then in the presence of God and heavenly angels and the hosts of the
redeemed the sins of God's people will be placed upon Satan; he will be declared guilty of
all the evil which he has caused them to commit. And as the scapegoat was sent away into a
land not inhabited, so Satan will be banished to the desolate earth, an uninhabited and
dreary wilderness.
The revelator foretells the banishment of Satan and the condition of chaos and desolation
to which the earth is to be reduced, and he declares that this condition will exist for a
thousand years. After presenting the scenes of the Lord's second coming and the
destruction of the wicked, the prophecy continues: "I saw an angel come down from
heaven, having the key of the bottomless pit and a great chain in his hand. And he laid
hold on the dragon, that old serpent, which is the devil, and Satan, and bound him a
thousand years, and cast him into the bottomless pit, and shut him up, and set a seal upon
him, that he should deceive the nations no more, till the thousand years should be
fulfilled: and after that he must be loosed a little season." Revelation 20:1-3.
That the expression "bottomless pit" represents the earth in a state of
confusion and darkness is evident from other scriptures. Concerning the condition of the
earth "in the beginning," the Bible record says that it "was without form,
and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep." [THE HEBREW WORD HERE
TRANSLATED "DEEP" IS RENDERED IN THE SEPTUAGINT (GREEK) TRANSLATION OF THE
HEBREW OLD TESTAMENT BY THE SAME WORD RENDERED "BOTTOMLESS PIT" IN REVELATION
20:1-3.]
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Genesis 1:2. Prophecy teaches that it will be brought back, partially at least, to this
condition. Looking forward to the great day of God, the prophet Jeremiah declares: "I
beheld the earth, and, lo, it was without form, and void; and the heavens, and they had no
light. I beheld the mountains, and, lo, they trembled, and all the hills moved lightly. I
beheld, and, lo, there was no man, and all the birds of the heavens were fled. I beheld,
and, lo, the fruitful place was a wilderness, and all the cities thereof were broken
down." Jeremiah 4:23-26.
Here is to be the home of Satan with his evil angels for a thousand years. Limited to the
earth, he will not have access to other worlds to tempt and annoy those who have never
fallen. It is in this sense that he is bound: there are none remaining, upon whom he can
exercise his power. He is wholly cut off from the work of deception and ruin which for so
many centuries has been his sole delight.
The prophet Isaiah, looking forward to the time of Satan's overthrow, exclaims: "How
art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! how art thou cut down to the
ground, which didst weaken the nations! . . . Thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend
into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God: . . . I will be like the Most
High. Yet thou shalt be brought down to hell, to the sides of the pit. They that see thee
shall narrowly look upon thee, and consider thee, saying, Is this the man that made the
earth to tremble, that did shake kingdoms; that made the world as a wilderness, and
destroyed the cities thereof; that opened not the house of his prisoners?" Isaiah
14:12-17.
For six thousand years, Satan's work of rebellion has "made the earth to
tremble." He had "made the world as a wilderness, and destroyed the cities
thereof." And he "opened not the house of his prisoners." For six thousand
years his prison house has received God's people, and he would have held them captive
forever; but Christ had broken his bonds and set the prisoners free.
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Even the wicked are now placed beyond the power of Satan, and alone with his evil angels
he remains to realize the effect of the curse which sin has brought. "The kings of
the nations, even all of them, lie in glory, everyone in his own house [the grave]. But
thou art cast out thy grave like an abominable branch. . . . Thou shalt not be joined with
them in burial, because thou hast destroyed thy land, and slain thy people." Isaiah
14:18-20.
For a thousand years, Satan will wander to and fro in the desolate earth to behold the
results of his rebellion against the law of God. During this time his sufferings are
intense. Since his fall his life of unceasing activity has banished reflection; but he is
now deprived of his power and left to contemplate the part which he has acted since first
he rebelled against the government of heaven, and to look forward with trembling and
terror to the dreadful future when he must suffer for all the evil that he has done and be
punished for the sins that he has caused to be committed.
To God's people the captivity of Satan will bring gladness and rejoicing. Says the
prophet: "It shall come to pass in the day that Jehovah shall give thee rest from thy
sorrow, and from thy trouble, and from the hard service wherein thou wast made to serve,
that thou shalt take up this parable against the king of Babylon [here representing
Satan], and say, How hath the oppressor ceased! . . . Jehovah hath broken the staff of the
wicked, the scepter of the rulers; that smote the peoples in wrath with a continual
stroke, that ruled the nations in anger, with a persecution that none restrained."
Verses 3-6, R.V.
During the thousand years between the first and the second resurrection the judgment of
the wicked takes place. The apostle Paul points to this judgment as an event that follows
the second advent. "Judge nothing before the time, until the Lord come, who both will
bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the counsels of
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the hearts." 1 Corinthians 4:5. Daniel declares that when the Ancient of Days came,
"judgment was given to the saints of the Most High." Daniel 7:22. At this time
the righteous reign as kings and priests unto God. John in the Revelation says: "I
saw thrones, and they sat upon them, and judgment was given unto them." "They
shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with Him a thousand years."
Revelation 20:4, 6. It is at this time that, as foretold by Paul, "the saints shall
judge the world." 1 Corinthians 6:2. In union with Christ they judge the wicked,
comparing their acts with the statute book, the Bible, and deciding every case according
to the deeds done in the body. Then the portion which the wicked must suffer is meted out,
according to their works; and it is recorded against their names in the book of death.
Satan also and evil angels are judged by Christ and His people. Says Paul: "Know ye
not that we shall judge angels?" Verse 3. And Jude declares that "the angels
which kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation, He hath reserved in
everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day." Jude 6.
At the close of the thousand years the second resurrection will take place. Then the
wicked will be raised from the dead and appear before God for the execution of "the
judgment written." Thus the revelator, after describing the resurrection of the
righteous, says: "The rest of the dead lived not again until the thousand years were
finished." Revelation 20:5. And Isaiah declares, concerning the wicked: "They
shall be gathered together, as prisoners are gathered in the pit, and shall be shut up in
the prison, and after many days shall they be visited." Isaiah 24:22.
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