Reflections on Revelation #275

‘Day 275

A quick overview of the 7 last plagues before the detail. As always everything in the Bible must be run through the prism of the cross. We have already noted that Rev 15 & 16 stands opposite the 7 trumpets of Rev 8-11 in the chiasm of the book. The trumpets had been partial judgments on the enemies of God’s people. Both the 7 trumpets and the 7 last plagues run the order of the days of creation backward. (see diagram from PPT presentation below.) This is de-creation! 

However, what is even more astonishing is that these plagues are the plagues of the cross! Jesus experienced the plagues. He experienced the “wrath of God” on our behalf. The spiritual struggle of Gethsemane is His Armageddon; the sores represent how he was treated like a leper – outside the gate. The blood and water from His side, the sun turning to darkness, the earthquake, the crown of thorns as the second Adam carried the curse upon His head, the cry, “it is finished,” echoes the cry of creation, re-creation and now de-creation.

In effect, Rev 16 is telling us that either we accept the fact that Jesus took the wrath of God on our behalf, or we must experience it for ourselves. That’s the exchange made at the cross; our sin becomes His and His perfection becomes ours; our death becomes His and His life becomes ours. Our condemnation is upon Him and His acceptance before the father is now upon us. When you have made that exchange you have been “born again.” He was treated as we deserve so that we could be treated as He deserves.

He suffered the death which was ours so that we might receive the life that was his; He was condemned for our sin in which He had no share so that we might be justified by His righteousness in which we have no share. This is the Gospel of the 7 last plagues. Like the plagues in Egypt, they do not come upon God’s people, because we have applied the blood of Christ to the doorpost of our lives. 

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