*    *    *     P L A G U E S    1  -  4     *    *    *    

        The first four plagues represent Satan's efforts to destroy God's
    people through the elements (or indirectly through man).  It would
    appear from the information we have that the nature of the first four
    plagues is very similar to nuclear warfare. 

            Everything in the world is in an unsettled state.  Theþ,  
        nations are angry, and great preparations for war are being 
        made, but although the nations are mustering their forces for 
        war and blood-shed, the command to the angels is still in 
        force. 

        Then in the next statement after these winds are let loose . . . 

            Deadly instruements of warefare will be invented . . . 

        (Remember that this was written in 1900 A.D. and there was no
    recognition by the author of what these would be.) 

            Vessels with their living cargo's will be entombed in the 
        great deep.  All who have not the spirit of truth will unite 
        under the leadership of satanic agencies, but they are to be 
        kept under control until the time shall come for the great 
        battle of Armageddon. 

        (Which is formed under the sixth plague.) 

            Then the powers of earth will marshall their forces for 
        the last great struggle. 

        Let us look now at these first four plagues. 

        Rev. 16:1-9 

        The bowls or vials mentioned here are a symbolic expression from
    the Sanctuary service.  Judgments were always accompanied by some kind
    of libation; the pouring out of some liquid, to indicate some special
    kind of judgment. 

        Why should these plagues only fall on those with the mark of the
    beast and worshiped his image;  Satan is trying to destroy God's
    people? 

        For the obvious reason, Satan is trying to destroy God's people
    but God is protecting them; so in the process he winds up wiping out a
    good portion of his own.  But he is perfectly willing to make that
    sacrifice if he can also get at God's people.  But in his final fling,
    the world and the universe is going to see that in fact God is going
    to watch over these people.  He will not allow Satan to destroy them,
    there would be no point in it. 

                Patriarchs & Prophets (98) 
            The seal of Heaven was on that door . . .  So when Christ 
        shall cease His intercession for guilty men, before His coming 
        in the coulds of Heaven, the door of mercy will be shut.  Then 
        divine grace will no longer restrain the wicked, and Satan 
        will have full control of those who have rejected mercy.  They 
        will endeavor to destroy God's people; but as Noah was shut 
        into the ark, so the righteous will be shielded by divine 
        power. 

        In verse 7 we read; "And I heard the altar saying, "Yes, O Lord
    God, the Almighty, true and righteous are Thy  judgments." 

        It sounds so horrible that an interjection is made here.  God ,
    why are you letting this happen?  But when this happening the angelic
    beings are saying; "God it is a horrible thing that has to happen, but
    we fully exonerate your actions in letting Satan do his thing." This
    is part of the final revelation of God.  And this is one of the great-
    est demonstrations of what it would be like to live in a kingdom com-
    pletly dominated by Satan.  And recognizing the larger revelatory
    thrust that is made by the people who witness this as aweful as it
    seems, the heavenly world cries out: "God we honor You in what You are
    doing." 

        It seems so hoerrible and that is why we have this comment inter-
    jected at the midst of such a very horrible plague.  The heavenly
    beings recognize that God is very just in allowing Satan this kind of
    power. 

        With these first four plagues (or judgments and in the Greek
    `vials') Satan is trying through the elements to exterminate the
    people of God.  But what does he accomplish?  He almost wipes out his
    own kingdom!  We are told that these plagues are not universal or else
    he would.  God even protects Satan's kingdom.  Satan goes into such a
    frenzy, attacking the people of God, but they are protected, and he
    decimates his own. 

        Some additional sources of reference are found in the early part
    of Testimonies to the Church vol. 9.  Evangelism p29.  The texts men 
    ioned are Joel 2:1, 2; Isiah 24, 25, 30:3, 33:14, 15, Jeremiah 4,
    and Psalms 91. 

        This study is not insisting on nuclear warefare;  but, the
    descriptions certainly fit.  Satan is unable to wipe out God's people,
    but he is accomplishing one thing; he is infuriating his own people
    and he is able then to use them to try and wipeout God's people. 

        Plagues five and six describe how he is going to try and destroy
    God's people through the frenzy of his own people. 
 
           *    *    *     P L A G U E S   5  &  6     *    *    * 

        Rev. 16: 10, 11. 

        Here we see the people (Satan's) turn to religion because they are
    desparate, seeking truth what are they told? 

                G.C.  (590) 
            And then the great deceiver will persuade men that those 
        who serve God are causing these evils.  . . .  It will be de- 
        clared that men are offending God by violation of the Sunday 
        sabbath; that this sin has brought calamities which will not 
        not cease until Sunday observance shall be strictly enforced; 
        and that those who present the claims of the fourth command- 
        ments, thus destroying reverence for Sunday, are troublers of 
        the people, preventing their restoration to divine favor and 
        temporal prosperity. 

        These people are looking for answers from religious institutions
    and they get darkness.  On the one hand they curse God for these
    calamities and on the other, they are seeking some solution from Him.
    They are not told that they have offended God; they are given instead
    a blasphemous lie.  And those who really are the children of God, if
    they can be wiped out then these judgments will stop; and buttressed
    by a literal darkness this terrible interpretation of reality which is
    just the opposite of light, the truth; leads them toward the children
    of God.  Now the warefare has stopped.  Satan has not been able to
    exterminate the people of God through the elements or war.  Now he
    frenzies the people and he brings this great darkness upon them which
    prepares them for his personal leadership. 

        Rev. 16:12 

        The religious forces have lost their lustre, they have lost their
    punch.  So the demonic takes over and they are seen for what they are;
    puppets for the satanic.  Spiritism will be manifest and through these
    forces of the satanic, Satan will come as an angel of light, claiming
    to be Christ.  The people have become disenchanted with the religious
    organizations, they have served their purpose, Satan wants nothing
    more to do with them and he now takes over to run the battle himself.
     These spiritistic forces will assemble the whole world; "the kings of
    the earth".  You cannot do it by fighting amoung yourselves, let's all
    get under the banner of this pseudo-christ. 

        This is what is happening under the sixth judgment. 

        And then, again, this insertion, as in the third judgment; a
    reminder for us not to lose perspective! 

            Lo, I am coming like a thief!  Blessed is he who is awake, 
        keeping his garments that he may not go naked and be seen 
        exposed! 
  
             *    *    *     A R M A G E D D O N     *    *    * 

                Rev. 16:16  (NASB) 
            And they gathered them together to the place which is 
        Hebrew is called Har-Magedon. 

            "They" meaning these spiritistic mediums being spoken about in
    the previous verses. 

        Now this is where we come to one of the major thrusts of these
    plagues. 

        This word HAR-MAGEDON  (or ARMEGODDON); if we could discover what
    it means we would have the key to the climax of this whole drama.  The
    word has no meaning in Greek, it is a sound-a-like word.  The Greek
    word HAR-MAGEDON is simply a soun-a-like word taken from some Hebrew
    expression. 

        If we take that sound-a-like Greek word and form the Hebrew words,
    we have two words.  The first word is HAR, and this means mountain.
    There is no question about that, no one argues about that.  But, the
    second word "MAGEDON" can either refer to the word Megiddo, which is a
    city in the southern part of the plain, or valley of Megiddo, in west-
    ern Palestine, which in fact is sometimes mistakenly refered to as the
    Valley of Armageddon. 

        Or, it can refer to the word "MO`ED" (or MOGAD), which means
    assembly or gathering. 

        I have gone through the Old Testament and read every text where
    Megiddo is used, and ALWAYS it refers to a valley (plain) or the city;
    it is never applied in scripture to a mountain.  And yet throughout
    the years most Christians (Seventhday Adventists included), mostly
    through the influence of Uriah Smith who was influenced probably by
    the current events of his day, the overthrow of the Turkish Ottoman
    Empire, and the discussion at that time of who the king of the north
    was, that he put together Mountain and the City Megiddo, and came up
    with this (nebulous) Mount Megiddo, which does not exist, nor ever
    has; but he took Mount and refered to a City.  You cannot put Mount
    and City (or plain) together that way.  Mountain always refers to an
    elevation and there is no way, in going through all these verses, that
    Megiddo can fit with HAR if we are going to be linguistically honest. 

        Now the other word MOGAD, is from a Hebrew word YA`GAD, which
    means "to gather in assembly", to get together in some kind of congre-
    gation for some kind of festival or some kind of meeting.  When look-
    ing up Old Testament verses where this expression is used, the word is
    either used for a special festival where all the people got together
    around the Tabernacle or Sanctuary, and it refered either to the
    festival or to the point of gathering. 

        At first look, t may not make a lot of sense.  What does it mean
    Mount of the Congregation, Mount of Gathering?  But that is they way
    it is.  In fact it became to be used as an expression where it refered
    to the Sanctuary itself, when and where God was supposed to manifest
    His presence. 

        In the wilderness, when all the congregation got together it was
    spoken of as the Tent of teh Assembly; God was ruler and the people
    were gathered around the Sanctuary.  Later when Solomon's temple was
    built on the northern rim of the crest of Mount Olivet, anyone coming
    into the city of Jerusalem could see it.  And what had been refered to
    as the Tent of the Meeting, became traaansfered to this elevation;
    when they nolonger carried the Tabernacle around with them in a Tent.
    When the Temple was put on this northern edge of the Mount of Olives,
    then the expression became Mount of the Congregation.  And this is
    where God met with His people, and whenever they got together, here
    were God's people and God was their ruler; Ruler of the Congregation.
    But what did this have to do with Revelation 16:16? 

        Then comes the picture from Isaiah, refering to Satan's claims
    against God originally: 

                Isaiah 14:12 - 14  (RSV) 
            How you are fallen from Heaven, 
                        O Day Star, Son of Dawn! 
            How you are cut down to the ground, 
                        you who laid the nations low! 
            You said in your heart, 
                        `I will ascend to heaven; 
            above the stars of God 
                        I will set my throne on high; 
            I will sit on the mount of assembly 
                        in the far north; 
            I will ascend above the heights of the clouds, 
                        I will make myself like the Most High.' 

        NOW here is this expression "Mount of Assembly"! if we were to
    translate that into the Greek sound-a-like expression we would say "I
    will sit upon Har-Magedon"; Mount of the Congregation, Mountain of the
    people of God in the far north.  You see the symbolism that was used
    to refer to Solomon's temple on the north ridge in this elevated
    place, where everyone could see it, is where God dwelt.  But that was
    only the symbol for God who is in the temple in Heaven and who rules
    all the earth.  But Satan says; "I will ascend to the mount of the
    assembly, I will be a better ruler.  I can do a better job.  I can run
    a better government.  I want to ascend to this elevated place where I
    can be king of the mountain". 

        God who claimed to be ruler of His people (His congregation) from
    the recesses of the north, was being "bumped" by Satan who is claiming
    to be able to run a better government.  And thus we havce this
    expression from: 

                Psalms 48:1, 2 (RSV) 
            Great is the Lord and greatly to be praised 
                in the City of our God! 
            His holy mountain, beautiful in elevation, 
                is the joy of all the earth, 
            Mount Zion, in the far north, 
                the city of the great King. 

        Ah, this is Armageddon.  Mount of the Congregation where God rules
    Hos people.  And we are told that in Satan's original claim: "I want
    to be King of the Mountain", he will make again under the sixth
    plague. 

                II Thessalonians 2:3, 4  (RSV) 
            Let no man deceive you in any way; for that day will not 
        come, unless the rebellion comes first, and the man of law- 
        lessness is revealed, the son of perdition, who opposes and 
        exhaults himself against every so-called god or object of 
        worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, 
        proclaiming himself to be God. 

        Now that is what Satan does under the sixth plague. 

        Let us now read the most profound statement that describes this
    plague: 

                G.C.  (624) 
            Fearful sights of a supernatural character will soon be
        revealed in the heavens, in token of the power of miracle-
        working demons.  The spirit of devils will go forth to the
        kings of the earth and to the whole world, to fasten them in
        deception, and urge them on to unite with Satan in his last
        struggle against the government of heaven.  By these agencies,
        rulers and subjects will be alike deceived.  Persons will
        arise pretending to be Christ Himself, and claiming the title
        and worship which belong to the world's Redeemer.  They will
        perform wonderful miracles of healing and will profess to have
        revelations from heaven contradicting the testimony of the
        Scriptures. 

        Here is a paraphrase of the sixth plague, the spirit of devils
    going forth  . . . to fasten them in deception.  What is the
    deception?  They, the people of this earth are going to get darkness;
    it is the people of God who are at fault, it is not us!  People are
    searching for answers and Satan creates this confusion in preparation
    for his own presentation. 

            As the crowning act in the great drama of deception, Satan 
        himself will personate Christ.  The Church has long professed 
        to look to the Savior's advent as the consumation of her 
        hopes.  Now the great deceiver will make it appear that Christ 
        has come.  In different parts of the earth Satan will manifest 
        himself amoung man as a majestic being of dazzling brightness, 
        resembling the description of the Son of God given by John in 
        the Revelation.  (Revelation 1:13-15).  The glory that sur- 
        rounds him is unsurpassed by anything that mortal eyes have 
        yet beheld.  The shout of triumph rings out upon the air: 
        "Christ has come, Christ has come!" The people prostrate 
        themselves in adoration before him, while he lifts up his 
        hands and pronounces a blessing upon them, as Christ blessed 
        His disciples when He was upon the earth.  His voice is soft 
        and subdued, yet full of melody.  In gentle, compassionate 
        tones he presents some of the same gracious, heavenly truths 
        which the Savior uttered; he heals the diseases of the people, 
        and then, in his assumed character of Christ, he claims to 
        have changed the Sabbath to Sunday, and commands all to hallow 
        the day which he has blessed.  He declares that those who 
        persist in keeping holy the seventh day are blaspheming his 
        name by refusing to listen to his angels he sent to them with 
        light and truth.  This is the strong, almost overmastering 
        delusion. 

        What are the people going to say when Christ himself claims to
    have changed the Sabbath?  And then the parallel statement: 

                G.C.  (635) 
            When the protection of human laws shall be withdrawn from 
        those who honor the law of God, there will be, in different 
        lands, a simultaneous movement for their destruction.  As the 
        time appointed in the decree draws near, the people will con- 
        spire to root out the hated sect.  It will be determined to 
        strike in one night a decisive blow, which shall utterly 
        silence the voice of dissent and reproof. 

        And now another statement, speaking about the end of the 2300 day
    prophecy: 

                E.W. (55, 56) 
            Then Jesus rose from the throne, and most of those who were 
        bowed down arose with Him.  I did not see one ray of light pass 
        from Jesus to the CARELESS multitude after He arose, and they 
        were left in perfect darkness . . .  Those who rose up with 
        Jesus would send up their faith to Him in the Holiest, and 
        pray, "My Father, give us thy Spirit." Then Jesus would breath 
        upon them the Holy Ghost.  In that breath was light, power, 
        and much love, joy, and peace. 

        Now this is where Satan personates Christ.  (You really need to
    read all of these two or three pages in Early Writings.) 

            I turned to look at the company who were still bowed 
        before the throne; they did not know that Jesus had left it. 
        Satan appeared to be by the throne, TRYING TO CARRY ON THE 
        WORK OF GOD.  I saw them look up to the throne, and pray, 
        "Father, give us Thy Spirit".  Satan would breathe upon them 
        an UNHOLY influence; in it there was light and much power, but 
        no sweet love, joy, and peace.  Satan's object was to keep 
        them deceived and to draw back and deceive God's children. 

        Armageddon (Har-Magedon) is a condition in which Satan personates
    Christ and makes this one final claim to be God, to master and rule
    the entire world.  The deception has been prepared under the fifth
    judgment.  He is through with these religious organizations, the
    waters are dried up, he no longer relies on his agents, he appears and
    takes control himself.  Just as the Holy Spirit is the dominating
    person and the controlling person in the lives of the people of God,
    so are the spiritistic forces the dominating influences of the enemy,
    and Satan marches them against the people of God so they cannot form,
    so they cannot be a people, so they cannot be presented to the world
    and the universe by God.  And now he prepares to lead his people to
    march at midnight.  But what do we find? 

        God speaks in the seventh judgment. 


          *    *    *     P L A G U E    7     *    *    * 

        God now for the first time since He went into hiding, comes
    out.  This is foretold in several passages: 

                Isaiah 42:13  (RSV) 
            The Lord goes forth like a mighty man, 
                like a man of war He stirs up His fury; 
            He cries out, He shouts aloud, 
                He shows Himself mighty against His foes. 

                Amos 1:2  (RSV) 
            The Lord roars from Zion, 
                and utters His voice from Jerusalem; 

                Zachariah 14:1-4   (RSV) 
            Behold, a day of the Lord is coming, when the spoil 
        taken from you will be divided in the midst of you.  For I 
        will gather all the nations against Jerusalem to battle. 
        . . .  Then the Lord will go forth and fight against those 
        nations as when He fights on the day of battle.  On that 
        day His feet shall stand on the Mount of Olives which lies 
        before Jerusalem on the east;  and the Mount of Olives 
        shall be split in two from east to west by a very wide 
        valley; so that one half of the Mount shall withdraw 
        northward, and the other half southward. 

                Joel 3:9-17  (RSV) 
            Proclaim this among the nations: 
                Prepare, war, 
                    stir up the mighty men. 
            Let all the men of war draw near,  
                let them come up. 
            Beat your plowshares into swords, 
                and your pruning hooks into spears; 
                    let the weak say, "I am a warrior." 
            Hasten and come, 
                all you nations round about, 
                    gather yourselves there. 
            Bring down thy warriors, O Lord.  
                Let the nations bestir themselves, 
                    and come up to the valley of Jehoshaphat; 

        This word "Jehoshaphat" comes from two words, the first
    "Yahweh" meaning Jehovah, God; and the second "Shophat", which
    means to judge.  "Come up to the judgment of God!" 
        Now God is going to speak. 

            for there I will sit to judge 
                all the nations round about.

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