And after these things I saw
another angel come down from
heaven, having great power;
and the earth was lightened with his
glory.
2. And he cried mightily with a
strong voice, saying, Babylon the great is fallen,
is fallen, and is become the habitation of devils,
and the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every
unclean and hateful bird.
3. For all nations have drunk of
the wine of the wrath of her fornication, and
the kings of the earth have committed fornication
with her, and the merchants of the earth are waxed
rich through the abundance of her delicacies.
A movement of mighty power is symbolized
in these verses. The chronology of the events
described in the preceding chapter brings us down to
the time when the ten horns turn against the Papacy
by depriving her of her temporal authority. This,
as we have already seen, was completely fulfilled
in 1870 and constituted the fifth plague. In the
description of the sixth plague which followed, it
was shown that the great city which was invaded was
composed of three parts Paganism (the modern
form of the dragon power), Catholicism, and Protestantism.
The same great city is here brought to view, and the
angel from heaven, with a mighty voice, cries, “Babylon
the Great is fallen, is fallen.” This fall
of Babylon can not signify a literal destruction;
for there are certain events to take place in Babylon
after her fall which entirely precludes that idea;
for instance, the calling of God’s people out
of her, in order that they may not receive of her
plagues. In these plagues is embraced her literal
destruction, or complete overthrow. The fall is
therefore a moral one; for the result of it is that
Babylon becomes “the habitation of devils, and
the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every
unclean and hateful bird.”
Protestants who make any attempt to
interpret these prophecies usually limit the designation
“Babylon the Great” in these verses to
the church of Rome, because the woman symbolizing
the apostate church in the preceding chapter is denominated
“Babylon the Great.” Ver 5.
But the same verse also declares her to be the “Mother
of harlots;” and if she as a degraded woman
stands as the representative of a corrupt church,
her unchaste daughters, also, must symbolize churches
that are her descendants; and if the real name of
the mother is Babylon, as stated, the proper
name of her harlot daughters must be Babylon also.
Whether, therefore, the mother or the daughters are
referred to, it is all “Babylon the Great,”
because it is all the same family and is a part of
that “GREAT CITY which reigneth over the kings
of the earth.” Chap 17:18. We must,
therefore, have something besides the mere title “Babylon
the Great” to determine which division of the
great city is referred to in a given instance whether
Pagan, Papal, or Protestant.
A careful study of the prophecy now
under consideration will show that it has particular
reference to the Protestant division of Babylon.
It contained many of God’s children; whereas
Paganism was always a false religion and never held
any of God’s saints. Under the reign of
Catholicism, the people of God are represented in all
the symbols of this book relating thereto as existing
entirely separate from that communion. The description
of this apostate church given in the preceding chapter
shows clearly that instead of being partly composed
of God’s saints, she was their most bitter and
relentless persecutor, yea, was “drunken
with the blood of the saints, and with the blood
of the martyrs of Jesus.” This is definite
proof that the present phase of Babylon under consideration
is the Protestant division; and her moral fall is
the grand signal for the escape of God’s people
who have partly composed her number, as the fall of
ancient Babylon was for the escape of the Israelites.
In their younger days the Protestant organizations
(symbolized by the daughters) were of much better character
than the mother church from whom they descended.
Many of them started out on reform. While a spiritual
people, God worked with them; but when they made their
image to the beast, they suddenly declined, and this
voice from heaven finally declares them to be in a
fallen condition entirely void of salvation,
except a very few chosen saints that have not defiled
their garments, contained therein.
That this application of the term
Babylon is correct, and also, the fallen condition
ascribed to her in accordance with the facts, I will
prove by the following testimonies of Protestants themselves.
The first is from Vision of the Ages; or, Lectures
on the Apocalypse, by B.W. Johnson, member of
the Christian sect.
“It is needful to inquire what
the term Babylon means. It occurs several
times in the New Testament. Here (in the Apocalypse)
it is spoken of as ‘that great city,’
and her fall is doomed ’because she hath made
all nations drunk with the wine of her fornication.’
In Rev 17:5, a scarlet harlot is seen sitting upon
the seven-headed and ten-horned monster, and upon
her forehead is written, ‘Mystery, Babylon the
Great.’ With this woman the kings of the
earth are said to have committed fornication.
In chapter 18 the fall of the great city, Babylon is
detailed at length, and it is again said that all the
kings of the earth have committed fornication with
her. The harlot with Babylon stamped on her brow,
and the great city of fornication styled Babylon, in
chapters 14 and 18, are one and the same existence.
“There is an ancient city of
Babylon often mentioned in the Old Testament, but
ages before John wrote, it had ceased to be inhabited,
the only dwellers among its lonely ruins were howling
beasts and hissing serpents. It has never been
rebuilt to this day and has passed away foreVer
John refers therefore not to old Babylon, but to some
power yet unseen (when he was upon the earth), that
should be revealed in due time, and of which old Babylon
was a symbol. Let us notice some of the features
of ancient Babylon.
“1. On that site took place
the confusion of tongues which divided those who before
had been of one speech and one family, into various
tribes and schisms at variance with each other and
of various tongues. The word Babylon, a memorial
of this event, means confusion, and is derived from
Babel.
“2. Old Babylon persecuted
the people of God and destroyed the temple in Jerusalem.
“3. It carried the people of God into captivity.
“4. It was a mighty, resistless
universal empire. The antitype, the spiritual
Babylon, must correspond. There is a power that
exhibits all these characteristics. By apostasy
from the truth it originated the schism which has
divided the family of God into different sects and
parties which speak a different spiritual language.
It has carried the church into a long captivity by
binding upon it the thralldom of superstition.
It has been a constant persecutor of the saints, and
has enjoyed an almost universal dominion. That
power is the woman that sits upon the seven-headed
beast ... the false woman, symbolical of a false church,
the great apostate spiritual dominion of Rome.
And we may add, out of which have come directly
or indirectly all the religious sects
of the present day.”
Dr. Barnes says: “The word
Babylon became the emblem of all that was haughty
and oppressive, and especially of all that persecuted
the church of God. The word here (Rev 18:4)
must be used to denote some power that resembled the
ancient and literal Babylon in these characteristics.
The literal Babylon was no more; but the name might
be used properly to denote a similar power.”
Wm. Kinkade, in Bible Doctrine, says, “I think Christ has a true church
on earth, but its members are scattered among the various
denominations, and are more or less under the influence
of mystery Babylon and her daughters.”
Alexander Campbell says: “A
reformation of Popery was attempted in Europe full
three centuries ago. It ended in a Protestant
hierarchy, and swarms of dissenters. Protestantism
has been reformed into Presbyterianism, that into
Congregationalism, and that into Baptistism, etc.,
etc. Methodism has attempted to reform all,
but has reformed itself into many forms of Wesleyanism. All of them retain in
their bosom in their ecclesiastical organizations, worship, doctrines, and
observances various relics of Popery. They are at best a reformation of Popery,
and only reformations in part. The doctrines and traditions of men yet impair
the power and progress of the gospel in their hands.
Again, he says: “The worshiping
establishments now in operation throughout Christendom,
increased and cemented by their respective voluminous
confessions of faith, and their ecclesiastical constitutions,
are not churches of Jesus Christ, but the legitimate
daughters of that mother of harlots, the church of
Rome.” How any man could possess as much
light on this subject as did Mr. Campbell, and then
build a sect himself, is more than I can understand.
Lorenzo Dow says of the Romish Church:
“If she be the mother, who are the daughters?
It must be the corrupt, national, established churches
that came out of her.”
In the Religious Encyclopædia, Article
Antichrist, we read: “The writer of the
book of Revelation tells us he heard a voice from heaven
saying, ’Come out of her, my people, that ye
partake not of her sins, and receive not of her plagues.’
If such persons are to be found in the ‘mother
of harlots,’ with much less hesitation may it
be inferred that they are connected with her unchaste
daughters, those national churches which are founded
upon what are called Protestant principles.”
In the Encyclopædia of Religious
Knowledge we read: “An important question,
however, says Mr. Jones, stills remains for inquiry:
Is Antichrist confined to the church of Rome?
The answer is readily returned in the affirmative
by Protestants in general; and happy had it been for
the world had that been the case. But although
we are fully warranted to consider that church as
‘the mother of harlots,’ the truth is
that by whatsoever arguments we succeed in fixing that
odius charge upon her, we shall, by parity of reasoning,
be obliged to allow other national churches to be
her unchaste daughters, and for this plain reason,
among others, because in their very constitution and
tendency they are hostile to the nature of the kingdom
of Christ.”
One of Martin Luther’s guests
remarked that the world might continue fifty years,
and he replied: “Pray God that it may not
exist so long; matters would be even worse than they
have been. There would rise up infinite sects
and schisms, which are at present hidden in men’s
hearts and nature. No; may the Lord come at once,
for there is no amendment to be expected.”
Mr. Hartly, a learned churchman, has
remarked as follows: “There are many prophecies
which declare the fall of the ecclesiastical powers
of the Christian world, and though each church seems
to flatter itself with the hope of being exempted,
yet it is very plain that the prophetical characters
belong to all. They all have left the true, pure,
simple religion, and teach for doctrines the commandments
of men.”
Says Mr. Simpson, in Plea for Religion:
“We Protestants, too, read the declaration of
the third angel against the worshipers of the beast
and his image, and make ourselves easy under the awful
denunciation by applying it exclusively to the church
of Rome; never dreaming that they are equally applicable
not only to the English, but to every church establishment
in Christendom, which retains any of the marks of the
beast. For though the Pope and the church of Rome
is at the head of the grand twelve hundred and sixty
years’ delusion, yet all other churches, of
whatever denomination, whether established or tolerated,
which partake of the same spirit, or have instituted
doctrines and ceremonies inimical to the pure and
unadulterated gospel of Christ, shall sooner or later
share in the fate of that immense fabric of human ordinances.”
Says Mr. Hopkins: “There
is no reason to consider the antichristian spirit
and practices confined to that which is now called
the church of Rome. The Protestant churches have
much of Antichrist in them, and are far from being
wholly reformed from the corruptions and wickedness,
in doctrine and practice, in it. Some churches
may be more pure and may have proceeded farther in
a reformation than others; but where can the church
be found which is thoroughly purged from her abominations?
None are wholly clear from an antichristian spirit
and the fruits of it.... And as the church of
Rome will have a large share in the cup of indignation
and wrath which will be poured out, so all the Christian
world will have a distinguished portion of it:
as the inhabitants of it are much more guilty than
others. There is great reason to conclude that
the world, particularly that part of it called Christian
and Protestant, will yet make greater and more rapid
advances in all kinds of moral corruption and open
wickedness, till it will come to that state in which
it will be fully ripe and prepared to be cut down by
the sickle of divine justice and wrath.”
Mr. O. Scott (Wesleyan Methodist)
says: “The church is as deeply infected
with a desire for worldly gain as the world. Most
of the denominations of the present day might be called
churches of the world, with more propriety
than churches of Christ. The churches have so
far gone from primitive Christianity that they need
a fresh regeneration a new kind of religion.”
Said T. DeWitt Talmage: “I
simply state a fact when I say that in many places
the church is surrendering, and the world is conquering....
There is a mighty host in the Christian church, positively
professing Christianity, who do not believe the Bible,
out and out and in and in.... Oh! we have magnificient
church machinery in this country; we have sixty thousand
American ministers; we have costly music; we have
great Sunday-schools; and yet I give you the appalling
statistics that in the last twenty-five years, laying
aside last year, the statistics of which I have not
yet seen, within the last twenty-five years
the churches of God in this country have averaged
less than two conversions a year each!
There has been an average of four or five deaths in
the churches. How soon, at that rate, will this
world be brought to God? We gain two; we lose
four. Eternal God! what will this come to?”
Bishop Roberts said: “The
popular religion of this country is not the religion
of the New Testament. It has some of its features
but not all. It is lacking in grand fundamental
elements. It answers many good purposes restrains,
refines, elevates, and gives to society a high grade
of civilization; but fails to secure the great end
which Christianity is designed to accomplish the
salvation of the soul. It dazzles but to blind,
it promises but to deceive; it allures by worldly
considerations to a heaven of purity, which no worldling
can enter; it gives to its votaries, who long to eat
of forbidden fruit, the assurance of impunity from
the threatened evils, and leads them on by siren strains
from the Paradise of purity into the broad road which
ends at last in the blackness of the darkness of an
eternal night of despair!”
Says the Golden Rule: “The
Protestants are outdoing the Popes in splendid, extravagant
folly in church building. Thousands on thousands
are expended in gay and costly ornaments to gratify
pride and a wicked ambition, that might and should
go to redeem the perishing millions! Does the
evil, the folly, and the madness of these proud, formal,
fashionable worshiper, stop here? These splendid
monuments of Popish pride, upon which millions are
squandered in our cities, virtually exclude the poor
for whom Christ died, and for whom he came especially
to preach.”
The report of the Michigan Yearly
Conference, even as long ago as 1851, published in
the True Wesleyan of No, says: “The
world, commercial, political, and ecclesiastical are
alike, and are together going in the broad way that
leads to death. Politics, commerce, and nominal
religion, all connive at sin, reciprocally aid each
other, and unite to crush the poor. Falsehood
is unblushingly uttered in the forum and in the pulpit;
and sins that would shock the moral sensibilities
of the heathen, go unrebuked in all the great denominations
of our land. These churches are like the
Jewish church when the Savior exclaimed, ’Woe
unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites.’”
Robert Atkins, in a sermon preached
in London, says: “The truly righteous are
diminished from the earth, and no man layeth it to
heart. The professors of religion of the present
day, in every church, are lovers of the world, conformers
to the world. Lovers of creature-comfort, and
aspirers after respectability. They are called
to suffer with Christ, but they shrink even
from reproach. Apostasy, apostasy, APOSTASY,
is engraven on the very front of every church; and
did they know it, and did they feel it, there might
be hope; but alas! they cry ’We are rich, and
increased in goods, and stand in need of nothing.’”
I have by no means exhausted the supply
of similar testimonies of Protestants now before me,
but for lack of space I must conclude. In the
face of these amazing facts can any one deny that Protestantism
is a part of great Babylon and is in a fallen condition?
“The merchants of the earth
are waxed rich through the abundance of her delicacies.”
A certain writer on this text has said: “Who
take the lead in all the extravagancies of the age?
Church-members. Who load their tables with the
richest and choicest viands? Church-members.
Who are foremost in extravagance in dress, and all
costly attire? Church-members. Who are the
very personification of pride and arrogance?
Church-members. Where shall we look for the very
highest exhibition of the luxury, even show, and pride
of life, resulting from the vanity and sin of the
race? Answer, To a modern church-assembly on a
pleasant Sunday.” Though this writer interpreted
the text literally, yet he spoke a vast amount of
truth, as every one knows.
Consider, too, the wickedness carried
on everywhere in sect Babylon unrebuked, with the
preachers ofttimes in the lead. Shows, festivals,
frolics, grab-bag parties, cake-walk lotteries, kissing-bees,
etc., etc. If the apostle were here
to-day and we should inform him of a modern church
entertainment where a bared female foot, projecting
from beneath a curtain, was sold to the highest gentleman
bidder, who had the privilege of kissing its owner
and taking her to supper, he would probably answer,
“Have I not told you, ’Babylon is fallen’?”
If his attention was called to the fact that the members
of a prominent church, in a novel entertainment, displayed
the likeness of a donkey, minus the tail, while the
members one by one were blindfolded, and, amid the
uproarous laughter of the crowd assembled, were given
the detached part to see who could place it the nearest
where it belonged, he would say with double emphasis,
“Have I not told you, ’BABYLON THE
GREAT IS FALLEN, IS FALLEN, AND IS BECOME THE HABITATION
OF DEVILS, AND THE HOLD OF EVERY FOUL SPIRIT, AND
A CAGE OF EVERY UNCLEAN AND HATEFUL BIRD’?”
The “abominations” are by no means confined
to the mother in the Revelation, but are also
to be found in abundance in connection with her harlot
daughters.
4. And I heard another
voice from heaven, saying, Come out of
her, my people, that ye be
not partakers of her sins, and that
ye receive not of her plagues.
5. For her sins have
reached unto heaven, and God hath
remembered her iniquities.
6. Reward her even as
she rewarded yon, and double unto her
double according to her works:
in the cup which she hath filled
fill to her double.
7. 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.
8. 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.
Here we have a number of important
truths brought before us first, that God
had a people in Babylon who up to this time were free
from her contaminations; second, that they received
a positive call from heaven to “come out”;
third, that all who refused to obey the heavenly command
would become partakers of her sins and receive of her
plagues; fourth, that those who came out were to pour
the strongest judgments upon Babylon “reward
her even as she rewarded you, and double unto her
double according to her works: in the cup which
she hath filled, fill to her double.” It
is evident that the “torment and sorrow”
which God’s people give Babylon after their
departure is not a temporal retaliation for
they never indulge in such, and the Word of God forbids
it but is altogether of a spiritual nature;
hence the fierce judgment they inflict is executing
the Word of truth, which brings to light all the wickedness
and abominations contained therein. “Death,
and mourning, and famine” only remain.
This symbolizes that all spiritual life has departed,
while famine and mourning are left. That such
is the actual fact is shown by the following lamentation
of the late Bishop R.S. Foster concerning his
own sect, the Methodist Episcopal:
“The ball, the theatre, nude
and lewd art, social luxuries, with all their loose
moralities, are making inroads into the sacred enclosure
of the church; and as a satisfaction for all this
worldliness, Christians are making a great deal of
Lent and Easter and Good Friday, and church ornamentations.
It is the old trick of Satan. The Jewish church
struck on that rock; the Romish church was wrecked
on the same; and the Protestant church is fast reaching
the same doom.
“Our great dangers as we see
them, are assimilation to the world, neglect of the
poor, substitution of the form for the fact of godliness,
abandonment of discipline, a hireling ministry, an
impure gospel, which summed up is a fashionable church.
That Methodists should be liable to such an outcome,
and that there should be signs of it in a hundred years
from the ‘sail-loft,’ seems almost the
miracle of history; but who that looks about him to-day
can fail to see the fact?
“Do not Methodists, in violation
of God’s Word and their own discipline, dress
as extravagantly and as fashionably as any other class?
Do not the ladies, and even the wives and daughters
of the ministry, put on ’gold and pearls and
costly array’? Would not the plain dress
insisted upon by John Wesley and Bishop Asbury, and
worn by Hester Ann Rodgers, Lady Huntington, and many
others equally distinguished, be now regarded in Methodist
circles as fanaticism? Can any one going into
the Methodist church in any of our chief cities distinguish
the attire of the communicants from that of the theater
and ball-goers? Is not worldliness seen in the
music? Elaborately dressed and ornamented choirs,
who in many cases make no profession of religion and
are often sneering skeptics, go through a cold artistic
or operatic performance, which is as much in harmony
with spiritual worship as an opera or theater.
Under such worldly performances spirituality is frozen
to death.
“Formerly every Methodist attended
class and gave testimony of experimental religion.
Now the class-meeting is attended by very few, and
in many churches abandoned. Seldom the stewards,
trustees and elders of the church attend class.
Formerly nearly every Methodist prayed, testified
or exhorted in prayer-meeting. Now but very few
are heard. Formerly shouts and praises were heard;
now such demostrations of holy enthusiasm and joy
are regarded as fanaticism.
“Worldly socials, and fairs,
festivals, concerts and such like have taken the place
of religious gatherings, revival meetings, class and
prayer meetings of earlier days. How true that
the Methodist discipline is a dead letter! Its
rules forbid the wearing of gold or pearls or costly
array; yet no one ever thinks of disciplining its members
for violating them. They forbid the reading of
such books and the taking of such diversions as do
not minister to godliness, yet the church itself goes
to frolics and festivals and fairs, which destroy the
spiritual life of the young, as well as the old.
The extent to which this is now carried on is appalling.
The spiritual death it carries in its train
will only be known when the millions it has swept
into hell shall stand before the judgment.
“The early Methodist ministers
went forth to sacrifice and to suffer for Christ.
They sought not places of ease and affluence, but of
privation and suffering. They gloried not in
their big salaries, fine parsonages, and refined congregations,
but in the souls that had been won for Jesus.
Oh, how changed! A hireling ministry will be
a feeble, a timid, a truckling, a timeserving ministry,
without faith, endurance, and holy power. Methodism
formerly dealt in the great central truth. Now
the pulpits deal largely in the generalities and in
popular lectures. The glorious doctrine of entire
sanctification is rarely heard and seldom witnessed
in the pulpits.”
This lengthy quotation shows clearly
the spiritual condition of Methodism, and certainly
she is no worse than the rest. God is calling
his people out of “all the places where they
have been scattered in the cloudy and dark day.”
Ezek 34:12. Those who refuse to walk in the light
will go into darkness. God help people to “flee
out of the midst of Babylon, and deliver every man
his soul.”
9. And the kings of the
earth, who have committed fornication
and lived deliciously with
her, shall bewail her, and lament for
her, when they shall see the
smoke of her burning,
10. Standing afar off
for the fear of her torment, saying, Alas,
alas that great city Babylon,
that mighty city! for in one hour
is thy judgment come.
11. And the merchants
of the earth shall weep and mourn over
her; for no man buyeth their
merchandise any more:
12. The merchandise of gold, and
silver, and precious stones, and of pearls, and
fine linen, and purple, and silk, and scarlet,
and all thyine wood, and all manner vessels of ivory,
and all manner vessels of most precious wood, and
of brass, and iron, and marble,
13. And cinnamon, and
odors, and ointments, and frankincense,
and wine, and oil, and fine
flour, and wheat, and beasts, and
sheep, and horses, and chariots,
and slaves, and souls of men.
14. And the fruits that
thy soul lusted after are departed from
thee, and all things which
were dainty and goodly are departed
from thee, and thou shalt
find them no more at all.
15. The merchants of
these things, which were made rich by her,
shall stand afar off for the
fear of her torment, weeping and
wailing,
16. 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!
17. For in one hour so
great riches is come to nought. And every
shipmaster, and all the company
in ships, and sailors, and as
many as trade by sea, stood
afar off,
18. And cried when they
saw the smoke of her burning, saying,
What city is like unto this
great city!
19. And they cast dust on their
heads, and cried, weeping and wailing, saying,
Alas, alas that great city, wherein were made rich
all that had ships in the sea by reason of her costliness!
for in one hour is she made desolate.
In this description we have a continuation
of the judgments of Babylon already introduced.
It must be borne in mind, however, that this is the
spiritual judgments following her moral fall, and not
her final and everlasting literal destruction.
The latter is described under another symbol a little
further on in this series of prophecy.
The symbol here is that of a great
city, the grand metropolis of the world, the mart
of earth’s commerce; a superb city, their [sic]
being no end to its luxuries and magnificence.
In it everything that can minister to the appetite,
gratify the taste, and feed the pride of the human
soul is to be found in profusion, being described at
length. This great city is suddenly afire, and
her merchants and the great men of the world who sustain
her are overwhelmed with sorrow at the sight of all
their wealth disappearing. Thus is great sect
Babylon represented. She is a mighty city extending
not only over the Apocalyptic earth, but, as symbolized
by the ship-masters, sailors, and foreign traders,
over the whole world. Suddenly she is set on
fire by heaven’s truth and her spiritual magnificence
destroyed. The apostle Paul describes the great
apostasy as a system that the “Lord shall consume
with the spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy
with the brightness of his coming.” 2 Thes
2:8. That spiritual consumption is now taking
place in accordance with the symbols of this chapter,
but the entire literal destruction of old Babylon
will take place coincident “with the brightness
of his coming,” as described in the following
chapter.
That sectarians are greatly alarmed
over the sad condition of their fallen churches is
clearly shown by the many quotations already given
from Protestant writers. They may not be aware
that it is a judgment from heaven upon man-made organizations;
but such we know it to be in the light of eternal
truth. Not only are they bewailing the loss of
spiritual life and the desolating famine in sectdom,
as was Bishop Foster and others, but they are beginning
to tremble for their own safety and to wonder what
the final outcome of it all will be. Wherever
the gospel truth has been preached in all its purity,
the sectarian denominations have been left destitute
of spiritual life; for the children of God have heard
his call, “Come out of her, my people,”
and have made their escape to Zion. Hence the
ministers of Babylon cry out continually, “Stop!
you are tearing our churches down,” “You
are taking our best members away from us,” etc.
But we can not withhold the truth; for the time has
come when God is gathering his people together out
of all the “places where they have been scattered
in the cloudy and dark day” (Ezek 34:12) into
the one church that Jesus built. “Babylon
is fallen, is fallen.”
20. Rejoice over her,
thou heaven, and ye holy apostles and
prophets; for God hath avenged
you on her.
This verse is so clear that it requires
no special explanation. God’s people are
delivered from sect Babylon; and while the judgments
of eternal truth are being poured out upon her, all
heaven and earth is called upon to rejoice and to
give glory to God.
“We stand in the glory that Jesus
has given,
The moon as the day-spring
doth shine;
The light of the sun is now equal to seven,
So bright is the glory divine.
“Now filled with the Spirit and
clad in the armor
Of light and omnipotent truth,
We’ll testify ever and Jesus we’ll
honor,
And stand from sin Babel aloof.
“The prophet’s keen vision
transpiercing the ages,
Beheld us to Zion return;
We’ll sing of our freedom, though
Babylon rages,
We’ll shout as her city
doth burn.”
21. And a mighty angel took up
a stone like a great millstone, and cast it into
the sea, saying, Thus with violence shall that great
city Babylon be thrown down, and shall be found no
more at all.
22. And the voice of harpers, and
musicians, and of pipers, and trumpeters, shall
be heard no more at all in thee; and no craftsman,
of whatsoever craft he be, shall be found any more
in thee; and the sound of a millstone shall be
heard no more at all in thee;
23. And the light of a candle shall
shine no more at all in thee; and the voice of
the bridegroom and of the bride shall be heard
no more at all in thee: for thy merchants were
the great men of the earth; for by thy sorceries
were all nations deceived.
24. And in her was found
the blood of prophets, and of saints,
and of all that were slain
upon the earth.
Following the moral fall of Babylon
and the call of God’s people out of her, a mighty
angel predicts her eternal doom. “With violence
shall that great city Babylon be thrown down, and
shall be found no more at all.”
This doubtless has reference to the entire city of
Babylon in all her divisions brought to view in this
series of prophecy and shows her final destruction
at the coming of Christ, when she shall suddenly be
thrown with terrific force, like a great millstone
descending into the sea, and “shall be found
no more at all.” According to the symbols
here given she will be like a city completely destroyed,
not one inhabitant or living creature remaining.
Thus her eternal doom is pictured and remains to be
yet fulfilled.
“And in her was found the blood
of prophets, and of saints, and of all that were slain
upon the earth.” We have already shown that
Protestantism, as well as her mother Romanism, has
been guilty of shedding innocent blood; and as the
term Babylon includes both these divisions, when the
great city is thrown down with violence, Romanism
and Protestantism will sink together, and then this
awful treasure the blood of prophets and
of saints shall be brought to light in that
last great day of God Almighty.