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8 The fourth angel poured out his bowl on the sun, and he was given power to burn the people with fire. 9 They were burned by the great heat, and they cursed the name of God, who had control over these disasters. But the people refused to change their hearts and lives and give glory to God. 10 The fifth angel poured out his bowl on the throne of the beast, and darkness covered its kingdom. People gnawed their tongues because of the pain. 11 They also cursed the God of heaven because of their pain and the sores they had, but they refused to change their hearts and turn away from the evil things they did. ~ Revelation 16:8-11
Today, we return to Revelation 16 where we find the seven bowl judgments of God. In today's text, we come to the fourth and the fifth bowl judgments.
In v.8-9 of today's text we read, "8 The fourth angel poured out his bowl on the sun, and he was given power to burn the people with fire. 9 They were burned by the great heat, and they cursed the name of God, who had control over these disasters. But the people refused to change their hearts and lives and give glory to God."
The fourth bowl will happen in rapid succession after the third. And, at this point in time, for a brief time, the sun's heat will suddenly and dramatically increase. This will be a much more intense form of what happens from time to time when flares of fire burst from the surface of the sun, sometimes causing havoc with the magnetism of the earth, and affecting radio waves. With the pouring out of this fourth bowl, an enormous flare from the sun will create intense heat upon the earth. People will be in anguish, and, they will see that this burst of heat will come from God.
This sounds a lot like a radiation burn. In the electromagnetic spectrum that measures wavelengths of radiation, there are long wavelength radiations like radio waves, and then there are short wavelength radiations like gamma rays. The shorter the wavelength, the more dangerous it is to the human body. In fact, short wavelengths can alter cell structure in the human body. A photon, for example, can kick an electron out of orbit in the cell structure and cause all sorts of damage.
In a practical sense, when we go to the beach on a cloudy day and think there is no danger from the sun because there is cloud cover, and at the end of the day we discover that we are burnt, we will have discovered this phenomena. The long wavelengths had been stopped by the clouds but the short wavelengths had penetrated the clouds and our bodies will show the impact.
This fourth bowl will cause an alteration in the earth's atmosphere. We know that the core of the sun is helium and if it were to expand outwardly it would incinerate the earth. There have been some problems with explosions on the sun causing power outages on the earth in the past.
In Isaiah 24:5-6 we read, "5 The people of the earth have ruined it, because they do not follow God’s teachings or obey God’s laws or keep their agreement with God that was to last forever. 6 So a curse will destroy the earth. The people of the world are guilty, so they will be burned up; only a few will be left."
In Malachi 4 we read, "There is a day coming that will burn like a hot furnace, and all the proud and evil people will be like straw. On that day they will be completely burned up so that not a root or branch will be left,” says the Lord All-Powerful."
This will be the end, and it will come fast. It will be awful, no seas, no fresh water, burning sun. We would think that if the people on the earth at that time were scorched with fierce heat like this, they would repent. But, according to v.9 of today's text, they will "refused to change their hearts and lives and give glory to God."
In v.10 of today's text we read, "The fifth angel poured out his bowl on the throne of the beast, and darkness covered its kingdom. People gnawed their tongues because of the pain."
With this fifth bowl, darkness will cover the earth. The entire system that will be called Babylon will then be engulfed in darkness. In Mark 13:24 we read, "In those days the sun will be dark and the moon will not give its light. The stars will be falling from heaven and the powers that are in the heavens shall be shaken."
This will be the mother of all power outages. It will be directed at the kingdom of the beast or the Antichrist. Ironically, his kingdom will become full of darkness. The intense heat in the previous bowl will come from the sun expanding into a supernova and after that phenomena occurs, a blackout. And, it will be darker than dark.
And, the people on earth will know who will be behind all of this, but they will refuse to repent and turn to God. They will know it’s God. But, they will be so in love with their sin, they will still not repent. They will be just like their leaders, Satan and the Antichrist. This is the height of arrogance and pride and stubbornness. Neither grace nor wrath will impact the hearts of these people. This underscores a very important point: If we will not be won by God's grace we will never be won at all.
At the end of v.10, the pain will be so bad they will gnaw their tongues. They will literally chew on their own tongues to distract themselves from their other agony. And while they’re chewing on their tongues, you might think they would repent, but no.
In v.11 we read, "They also cursed the God of heaven because of their pain and the sores they had, but they refused to change their hearts and turn away from the evil things they did."
This is the last reference to the unbeliever's unwillingness to change. So, they will curse God. These first five plagues were sent by God in order to get people to wake up and repent but they wouldn't do it. At this point their fate will be set and they will not be able to turn to God because it will be too late.
