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Revelation 16
4 The third poured out his bowl into the rivers and springs of water, and they became blood. 5 I heard the angel of the waters saying, "You are righteous, who are and who were, you Holy One, because you have judged these things. 6 For they poured out the blood of the saints and the prophets, and you have given them blood to drink. They deserve this." 7 I heard the altar saying, "Yes, Lord God, the Almighty, true and righteous are your judgments."
because you have judged these things
In our previous study we examined potential inferences of the word because at the beginning of this phrase. We explored the concept of judgment, particularly how the world defines judgment. It is vital to have a correct appreciation for what judgment means from heaven’s perspective, for this is one of the core issues in the controversy between Christ and Satan that has caused billions of people to reject God and has induced so much confusion even in the minds of untold numbers of angels.
We could spend weeks exploring this issue, and it would be helpful to do so. But I want to simply revisit this a bit more before we move forward in this passage. Let’s begin with some main points of differentiation between God’s use of this word judge and how it is typically assumed to mean in popular parlance.
First of all, judgment and justice overlap to a great extent. What we imagine as factual about justice and how we define justice affects what we assume to be true about judgment. We usually assume that judgment includes the execution or implementation of whatever we believe about justice. Thus if our ideas of justice are framed in legal thinking, then our opinions about judgment will also be legal oriented and likely our opinions about both will include law enforcement, punishment for crimes and the notion of balancing imaginary scales of justice.
This topic is so expansive it is hard to know where to begin. What is important is to come to a more enlightened awareness of this topic and to keep in mind that this started long before the creation week as described in Genesis 1 and 2. That event came long after the crisis in heaven that had possibly paralyzed the free function of God’s government throughout the whole universe. This would make creation week in part a statement by God to counter the darkness and chaos caused by Satan’s rebellion. That rebellion which is intensifying right now, involved this issue of the true meaning of justice along with how we perceive the motives of God in the way He relates to others. As we have been reminded throughout this book, the core issues of this war are message, motives and methods.
Here are some bullet points to summarize important elements involved in justice and judgment.
God’s ‘laws’ are actually self-enforcing principles we sometimes call natural law. I prefer to use the word principles to differentiate between God’s kind of laws and superficial laws.
Satan’s invention of trading/commerce redefines nearly every term we use including what we think about justice and judgment. The regulations and concepts that define worldly economics also control how we perceive law and all our relationships as well. God’s economy is very different from how we do things here on earth.
The sharp contrast between God’s design and Satan’s system is symbolized by the two signal trees central in the Garden of Eden. These two trees symbolize the difference between how God designed for us to live and interact with Him (freely), and how the world maintains order through hierarchy, use of power, coercion, deception, fear and manipulation (good and evil).
The two sides rely on very different ways to maintaining social cohesion and avoid chaos. From this perspective we can perceive how the ways of God are entirely different in most respects to our ways, for the motives and thoughts of heaven are in sharp contrast to what is pervasive on our planet. This difference becomes even more evident as we learn to test the spirit motiving people rather than attempting to figure out who is right or wrong.
The condemning power of Satan would lead him to institute a theory of justice inconsistent with mercy. He claims to be officiating as the voice and power of God, claims that his decisions are justice, are pure and without fault. Thus he takes his position on the judgment seat and declares that his counsels are infallible. Here his merciless justice comes in, a counterfeit of justice, abhorrent to God.{Christ Triumphant, p. 11}
(For those interested in more quotes parallel to this I have compiled a list.)
What is God’s kind of judgment? We have discussed this many times. It is defined by Jesus in John 3:19-21. It is not punishment or ‘executing justice.’ That is the counterfeit system invented by Satan and relied on by ‘those who dwell on the earth.’ God’s justice involves restoration for as many as possible who have been messed up by sin, yet while respecting each one’s freedom to choose their own destiny. But this is not the kind of judgment this angel seems to refer to here.
they poured out the blood of the saints and the prophets
This angel of the waters may be stating facts that are true. Yet it is not the facts that are the greater problem here but rather a disposition about how God is expected to respond to atrocities committed. We studied a similar expression of the symbolic ‘souls under the altar’ in the 5th trumpet.
They cried with a loud voice, saying, "How long, Master, the holy and true, until you judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth?" (Revelation 6:10)
It was given to him to give breath to it, to the image of the beast, that the image of the beast should both speak, and cause as many as wouldn't worship the image of the beast to be killed. (Revelation 13:15)
I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus. When I saw her, I wondered with great amazement. (Revelation 17:6)
In her was found the blood of prophets and of saints, and of all who have been slain on the earth. (Revelation 18:24)
for true and righteous are his judgments. For he has judged the great prostitute, who corrupted the earth with her sexual immorality, and he has avenged the blood of his servants at her hand." (Revelation 19:2)
Yahweh said, "What have you done? The voice of your brother's blood cries to me from the ground. (Genesis 4:10)
I will make my arrows drunk with blood. My sword shall devour flesh with the blood of the slain and the captives, from the head of the leaders of the enemy. Rejoice, you nations, with his people, for he will avenge the blood of his servants. He will render vengeance to his adversaries, And will make expiation for his land, for his people. (Deuteronomy 32:42-43)
When all the people saw it, they fell on their faces: and they said, Yahweh, he is God; Yahweh, he is God. and Elijah said to them, Take the prophets of Baal; don't let one of them escape. They took them; and Elijah brought them down to the brook Kishon, and killed them there. (1 Kings 18:39-40)
Then Jezebel send a messenger to Elijah, saying, So let the gods do to me, and more also, if I don't make your life as the life of one of them by tomorrow about this time. (1 Kings 19:2)
Surely at the commandment of Yahweh came this on Judah, to remove them out of his sight, for the sins of Manasseh, according to all that he did, and also for the innocent blood that he shed; for he filled Jerusalem with innocent blood: and Yahweh would not pardon. (2 Kings 24:3-4)
The kings of the earth didn't believe, neither all the inhabitants of the world, That the adversary and the enemy would enter into the gates of Jerusalem. It is because of the sins of her prophets, and the iniquities of her priests, That have shed the blood of the just in the midst of her. (Lamentations 4:12-13)
Jesus addressed this in various parables He shared, and the way He framed the idea of justice and judgment is meant to make us more aware of heaven’s perspective that is different from how we think. Some stories were framed in how we typically think, while others were designed to challenge us.
The farmers took his servants, beat one, killed another, and stoned another. Again, he sent other servants more than the first: and they treated them the same way. But afterward he sent to them his son, saying, 'They will respect my son.' But the farmers, when they saw the son, said among themselves, 'This is the heir. Come, let's kill him, and seize his inheritance.' So they took him, and threw him out of the vineyard, and killed him. When therefore the lord of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those farmers?" They told him, "He will miserably destroy those miserable men, and will lease out the vineyard to other farmers, who will give him the fruit in its season." (Matthew 21:35-41)
"Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you build the tombs of the prophets, and decorate the tombs of the righteous, and say, 'If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we wouldn't have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets.' Therefore you testify to yourselves that you are children of those who killed the prophets. Fill up, then, the measure of your fathers. You serpents, you offspring of vipers, how will you escape the judgment of Gehenna? Therefore, behold, I send to you prophets, wise men, and scribes. Some of them you will kill and crucify; and some of them you will scourge in your synagogues, and persecute from city to city; that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zachariah son of Barachiah, whom you killed between the sanctuary and the altar. Most certainly I tell you, all these things will come upon this generation. "Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets, and stones those who are sent to her! How often I would have gathered your children together, even as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you would not! (Matthew 23:29-37)
What is the point here? Are we suggesting there are no consequences to all the horrific atrocities and injustices committed against the innocent? Are we insinuating people can get away with evil?
It is essential to view this from the New Song paradigm to increase our understanding.
you have given them blood to drink
The further we get into the message of this angel the more clear the spirit involved can be discerned. He insists God gives them blood to drink, as if forcing people who have shed innocent blood to drink blood themselves supposedly will achieve equality or justice. This is a spirit of returning evil for evil, and while this is mainstream in how the world views justice, it is foreign to the ways the Lamb reveals the truth of God’s heart. This is not about natural outcomes or consequences but rather imposed punishments and as we have been learning, it thus cannot be of of the Father.
I will feed those who oppress you with their own flesh; and they shall be drunken with their own blood, as with sweet wine: and all flesh shall know that I, Yahweh, am your Savior, and your Redeemer, the Mighty One of Jacob. (Isaiah 49:26)
I will also water with your blood the land in which you swim, even to the mountains; and the watercourses shall be full of you. (Ezekiel 32:6)
In sharp contrast to these ancient, often immature views of God, compare the words of Jesus that have almost more shock effect than the previous references.
Jesus therefore said to them, "Most certainly I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you don't have life in yourselves. He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day. For my flesh is food indeed, and my blood is drink indeed." (John 6:53-55)
If we keep in mind the second principle of interpretation we rely on for this study, that everything is to be considered primarily and firstly as symbolic, what might emerge from perusing these various passages in light of a Jesus/Lamb version of God?
They deserve this [it is their just due (NKJV)]
Deserve is a word squarely in the middle of the whole system of reward and punishment thinking. That system originated in the practice of trading where relative value determines how we think about everything, how people are treated and whether favor or animosity should be shown. Deserve is about wages, clearly a part of the design of economics. Yet because the spirit of commerce permeates everything we think about including our relationship to God, it can be difficult to disentangle our thinking from parallel presumptions about justice. Yet this is vital for preparing us to participate in the kingdom of the Lamb where none of these things carry any credibility. This is noted in the story Jesus told of workers hired throughout the day yet were all paid the same at the end of the day. That story intentionally highlights the stark contrast between the way we were designed to live, and the dark effects of living selfishly under the influence of the earning/deserving mindset.
Here are other passages that reflect more or less this mindset of deserving.
If anyone has captivity, he will go. If anyone is with the sword, he must be killed. Here is the endurance and the faith of the saints. (Revelation 13:10)
Return to her just as she returned, and repay her double as she did, and according to her works. In the cup which she mixed, mix to her double. (Revelation 18:6)
"Rejoice over her, O heaven, you saints, apostles, and prophets; for God has judged your judgment on her." (Revelation 18:20)
This tenacious belief that God relates to others according to the earning/deserving system of valuation is possibly the most difficult to eradicate, even in the perceptions of unfallen beings elsewhere in the universe. It originated in the mind of Lucifer who first experimented with an alternate design of social order foreign to the design God implemented at creation. This is all embodied in the concept of justice and judgment, for what we believe about these words will be directly influenced by what we imagine God thinks in relation to His created children and where the Law fits into all this.
When we make the Law the supreme authority of the universe, we are actually following Satan’s lead in elevating legal conformity above having a dynamic relationship with the One whose name is Love. This is the great Lie that Jesus came to expose and discredit, that God relates to His children based on how well they keep His Law. As we discussed previously, this defines righteousness according to the Law rather than God’s righteousness apart from the Law. Making the Law more important than living in love is a sure sign we are trapped in the kingdom of darkness and fear, for as John writes, fear has to do with punishment and is not of love. So when it says that God has judged your judgment, He exposes our immature motives when we praise God for judging others. Such judgment is not what emanates from God’s heart but is rooted in our dark thinking caused by the earning/deserving, reward/punishment system symbolized by the Tree of Good and Evil.
Then spoke the priests and the prophets to the princes and to all the people, saying, This man is worthy of death; for he has prophesied against this city, as you have heard with your ears. (Jeremiah 26:11)
Then said the princes and all the people to the priests and to the prophets: This man is not worthy of death; for he has spoken to us in the name of Yahweh our God. (Jeremiah 26:16)
How does all this fit together cohesively? It certainly challenges our definitions of words involved. God’s ways are not our ways, so we must allow God to define what He means by the words used in Scripture to express what many times appears opposite to what they actually mean. It helps to be aware of how much the paradigms of trading and commerce dictate the way we interpret words and influences our ideas about justice, about how God treats sinners and even the nature of sin itself.
Don't judge, so that you won't be judged. For with whatever judgment you judge, you will be judged; and with whatever measure you measure, it will be measured to you. (Matthew 7:1-2)
He said to them, "Take heed what you hear. With whatever measure you measure, it will be measured to you, and more will be given to you who hear. (Mark 4:24)
How much worse punishment, do you think, will he be judged worthy of, who has trodden under foot the Son of God, and has counted the blood of the covenant with which he was sanctified an unholy thing, and has insulted the Spirit of grace? (Hebrews 10:29)
Remaining consistent in our use of the two filters from the first verse of this book, brings light to what is otherwise seemingly contradictory or inconsistent. As we cling to the Lamb’s version of truth and rely entirely on His revelation of truth about God and His design, then our eyes can be opened to see how these disturbing passages confirm truth as it is in Jesus. The wages of sin is not what God oversees but operates entirely in the system relied on by this world. This last verse refers to those who cling to the world’s version of justice based on imposed punishment, to assess how those under that system might determine the seriousness of the crime of despising and rejecting the opportunities provided by heaven for them to move into life out of the system of death.
This passage does not define God as the author of this punishment, but rather it highlights by contrast the mindset of payback, the justice system of this world, the way the counterfeit executes judgment. This invites one clinging to that mindset to employ that system to judge whether or not they should continue clinging to it while attributing it to God, or allow the Spirit of grace to deliver them from that dark system controlled by fear into His kingdom of love, truth and freedom.
If it seem evil to you to serve Yahweh, choose you this day whom you will serve; whether the gods which your fathers served that were beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you dwell: but as for me and my house, we will serve Yahweh. (Joshua 24:15)
with whatever judgment you judge, you will be judged; and with whatever measure you measure, it will be measured to you (Mark 4:24)
