Revelation 6:9-10: “When He opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain for the Word of God and for the testimony which they held. And they cried with a loud voice, saying, ‘How long, O Lord, holy and true, until You judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth?’”
The souls under the altar want the Lord to avenge their blood on those who dwell on the earth. They represent the cry of all martyrs from Abel to the last martyr of God.
“How Long O Lord?” They want justice. In Psalm 79:6, Asaph prayed, “Pour out Your wrath on the nations that do not know You, and on the kingdoms that do not call on Your Name.”
In Genesis 4:10-12, after Cain killed his younger brother, the Lord asked, “What have you done? The voice of your brother’s blood cries out to Me from the ground. So now you are cursed from the earth, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother’s blood from your hand. When you till the ground, it shall no longer yield its strength to you. A fugitive and a vagabond you shall be on the earth.”
The Lord gave to Cain a consequence for killing his brother. In Revelation 16:6, those who shed innocent blood receive the consequences they deserve: “They have shed the blood of saints and prophets, and You have given them blood to drink. For it is their just due.”
God also counts the blood of children as innocent blood. 2 Kings 21:6 says, “He [Manasseh] made his son pass through the fire...” 2 Kings 24:3-4 says, “Surely at the commandment of the Lord this came upon Judah, to remove them from His sight because of the sins of Manasseh, according to all that he had done, and also because of the innocent blood that he had shed; for he had filled Jerusalem with innocent blood, which the Lord would not pardon.”
False religions yield no salvation. Psalm 106:37 says that “they even sacrificed their sons and their daughters to demons.” The only One whose blood was without sin is Jesus Christ. God does not receive the blood of any other than His own Son to atone for the sins of humanity.
Innocent bloodshed is what makes horror movies so horrific. An Australian missionary once said to me, “Movies that glorify the shedding of innocent blood are satanic.” Visions of demons slaughtering innocent people is evil in God’s sight.
The devil tempts people to sin. Sin yields the curses of the Law. The devil, however, wants people to blame the followers of Christ for the world’s curses. To be their scapegoats.
In Deuteronomy 32:43, the Lord calls the nations to rejoice with His people, saying, “Rejoice, O Gentiles, with His people; for He will avenge the blood of His servants, and render vengeance to His adversaries. He will provide atonement for His land and His people.”
In 2 Kings 9:1-3, Elisha commissioned one of the sons of the prophets to anoint Jehu king over Israel while Jezebel was still a queen over them. The young man spoke the following words over Jehu as he anointed him, “You shall strike down the house of Ahab your master, that I may avenge the blood of My servants the prophets, and the blood of all the servants of the Lord, at the hand of Jezebel.” Jehu made sure that Jezebel died the disgraceful death she deserved.
In Luke 18:7, Jesus asked a rhetorical question, “Shall God not avenge His own elect who cry out day and night to Him, though He bears long with them?” “YES!” God will avenge their death.
In Revelation 8:13, John hears an angel say with a loud voice, “Woe, woe, woe to the inhabitants of the earth, because of the remaining blasts of the trumpet of the three angels who are about to sound!”
John, who recorded the words of Revelation for us, lost his brother James in Acts 12:2 when King Herod killed him with the sword. John saw Jesus crucified because of His love for people.
In Revelation 6:9, John saw the souls of the martyrs of Christ under an altar. The altar symbolizes a life poured out for God. Leviticus 4:7 says that the priest “shall pour the remaining blood at the base of the altar of the burnt offering.”
The Lord’s martyrs were slain for declaring God’s Word and for testifying for Jesus. Revelation 19:10 says, “The testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.” In Mark 13:9-10, Jesus said, “You will be brought before rulers and kings for My sake, for a testimony to them...”
Revelation 12:11 speaks of those who overcome the devil “by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, and they did not love their lives to the death.”
In Revelation 12:17, the devil is at war with those who keep the commandments and have the testimony of Jesus Christ. He is at war with those who preach the Law which condemns sin, and the Gospel which points to Jesus Christ as the only Savior from sin.
In Revelation 20:4, John sees “the souls of those who had been beheaded for their witness to Jesus and for the Word of God.” They refused “to worship the beast or his image, and had not received his mark on their foreheads or on their hands.” They live and reign with Christ.
Revelation 6:11: “Then a white robe was given to each of them; and it was said to them that they should rest a little while longer, until both the number of their fellow servants and their brethren, who would be killed as they were, was completed.”
The martyrs are told to rest a little while longer until the rest of their fellow servants and brothers are killed as they were.
It is a painful undertaking at times to save sinners. It cost God His Son. It cost God countless faithful saints and servants. Satan is very cruel. To rescue captives from him is to risk personal harm. But the devil’s day is coming.
In Acts 17:31, Paul told the Epicurean and Stoic people of Athens that “He [God] has appointed a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness by the Man whom He has ordained. He has given assurance of this to all by raising Him from the dead.”
In the last six verses of Revelation chapter six, “the wrath of the Lamb” is released. Who thought a Lamb could render such harsh judgments?
Revelation 6:12-17: “I looked when He opened the sixth seal, and behold, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became like blood. And the stars of heaven fell to the earth, as a fig tree drops its late figs when it is shaken by a mighty wind. Then the sky receded as a scroll when it is rolled up, and every mountain and island was moved out of its place. And the kings of the earth, the great men, the rich men, the commanders, the mighty men, every slave, and every free man, hid themselves in the caves and in the rocks of the mountains, and said to the mountains and rocks, “Fall on us and hide us from the face of Him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb! For the great day of His wrath has come, and who is able to stand?”
All classes of people want mountains and rocks to fall on them and hide them from the wrath of God and the wrath of the Lamb.
In Exodus 8:19, Pharaoh’s magicians recognized that God was plaguing Egypt. They said, “This is the finger of God.”
In Leviticus 26:1-44, God told Israel that they would be blessed if they obeyed Him and cursed if they defied Him.
As to curses, the Lord says in Leviticus 26:18, “After all this, if you do not obey Me, then I will punish you seven times more for your sins.” The Lord pauses between each set of seven judgments to give people an opportunity to repent.
Jesus Christ reveals three rounds of seven judgments in the Book of Revelation. Round one is the seven seal judgments (Revelation 6:6-7:5). Round two is the seven trumpet judgments (Revelation 7:7-15:8). Round three is the seven bowl judgments (Revelation 16:2-17:8).
Pharaoh would not have experienced ten plagues if he had repented after the first one, but he was hard-hearted. Likewise, many people in the last days will be like the Pharaoh and like the people of Sodom and Gomorrah. They will refuse to admit that ungodliness is wrong. In 2 Peter 2:6, 10, Peter wrote, “They are presumptuous, self-willed...”
We can choose to defy God, but we cannot choose the consequences that of such defiance.
The key difference between saints and sinners is that saints recognize their need for Christ to bear the curse of the Law for them and sinners do not.
In Galatians 3:10, Paul wrote, “Cursed is everyone who does not continue in all things which are written in the book of the Law, to do them.”
In Galatians 3:13-14, Paul wrote, “Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the Law, having become a curse for us... that the blessing of Abraham might come upon the Gentiles in Christ Jesus, that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.”
The Law demands a curse on whoever breaks it. “Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the Law” means that He covers our imperfect obedience with His perfect obedience. The blessing of Abraham is a friendly relationship with God. In James 2:23, it says, “Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness. And he was called the friend of God.”
As friends of God, we might experience temporary persecution from those who hate Him, but we will not experience God’s eternal wrath on sin.
God’s judgments on earth are lesser tribulations intended to save us from a greater tribulation, namely an eternity without Him in hell.
For example, in Acts 16:26- 31, the Lord called for an earthquake to open the prison cell where Paul and Silas had been locked up unjustly. The earthquake frightened the prison guard. He thought his prisoners had escaped. He was about to kill himself, but Paul stopped him and urged him to believe in Jesus. He and his entire family believed in Jesus. The earthquake prepared his heart to listen to the voice of God via Paul and Silas.
The people under the Lamb’s wrath ask who is able to stand before Him? Will you be able to stand before Him when your life is over? In Luke 21:36, Jesus said to “pray that you may be counted worthy to escape these things and to stand before the Son of Man.”
In Romans 5:1-2, we learn how to stand before God... “Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand.” We must stand before God clothed in the merits of Christ and not our own.
In Psalm 52:7-9, the Lord urges us not to be like the man who trusted in the abundance of his riches. In Psalm 53:1, David wrote, “I trust in the mercy of God forever and ever. I will praise You forever because You have done it...”
I like what missionary and martyr Jim Elliott once said, “He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.”
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