The Seals
Revelation chapter 6 begins with the seals that represent the beginning of Christ's judgment of unbelievers on the earth during the Tribulation period. There is a close similarity between these judgments and the event predicted by Christ (in Matthew 24:4-31).
This chapter unveils future events such as the rapture, three series of judgments that will fall on the earth during the tribulation, the emergence of the Antichrist, the persecution of Israel and her amazing revival, as well as Jesus' second coming with His saints to the earth, the judgment of Satan and his followers, and finally, the eternal state.
Revelation 6 opens with Jesus beginning to open the seven seals on a scroll containing God's judgment on sin (Revelation 5:1–2). The first seal is opened, and John then sees a rider on a white horse, wearing a crown and carrying a bow. His power is conquering, and this figure is most often associated with the Antichrist (Revelation 13:1–10).
The fourth seal and command bring a horse described using the Greek word chlōros. This is used elsewhere in the Bible to describe grass and plants: a yellowish green (Mark 6:39; Revelation 8:7; 9:4). While healthy in plants, in living flesh this is the color of infection and decay. It's translated as "pale" in many English translations to distinguish it from the first, white horse, and to evoke the imagery of the rider: Death. Death is followed by Hades: in this context, a reference to the unseen spiritual world. Whether this horseman's effects are separate from the other three, or coordinated, his impact is horrific. War, famine, disease, wild animals, and so forth kill a fourth of people of earth (Revelation 6:7–8).
When the fullness of time comes, the time that God has chosen, Jesus will appear in the clouds and blow the silver trumpet of redemption. He will gather all believers with Him in heaven. He will not come one hour early or late. He will be on time. It will be at the specific time He chose from the foundation of the earth.
Revelation Chapter 6
1 I watched as the Lamb (Jesus) opened the first of the seven seals. Then I heard one of the four living creatures say in a voice like thunder, “Come!”
(One of the four living creatures shouts in a thunderous voice. It is a command, to the first horseman, to come forth)
2 I looked, and there before me was a white horse! Its rider held a bow, and he was given a crown, and he rode out as a conqueror bent on conquest (Tribulation):
(This first seal introduces the antichrist onto the scene as a rider of a white horse. This rider wears a crown and will deceive many with talks of peace; He rules (a crown was given); he rules with a bow, not a sword; and he exercises dominion over the earth (went out conquering and to conquer).
(See metaphor of the bow as a symbol of conquest (Psalm 46:9; Jeremiah 49:35; Ezekiel 39:3; Hosea 1:5); there is more to conquest than war alone. Economic power, propaganda, the use of religion, diplomacy and political shrewdness are also part of successful conquest.
- 1 John 2:18-19 - Dear children, this is the last hour; and as you have heard that the antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have come. This is how we know it is the last hour.
- Matthew 24:5 - Jesus answered: "Watch out that no one deceives you. For many will come in my name, claiming, 'I am the Christ, ’ and will deceive many."
- 2 Thessalonians 2:6-7 - And now you know what is restraining, that he may be revealed in his own time. For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work; only He who now restrains will do so until He is taken out of the way.
- Ephesians 6:16 - In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one.
- Daniel 11:21 - And in his estate shall stand up a vile person, to whom they shall not give the honour of the kingdom: but he shall come in peaceably, and obtain the kingdom by flatteries.
- Daniel 8:25 - Through his craft and by his hand, he will cause deceit to prosper, and in his own mind he will make himself great. In a time of peace he will destroy many…
(Daniel tells us that the antichrist starts out as a peace maker, concerned with the peace between the Jews and their enemies. In short, that is when the clock starts ticking, a seven year period of global calamities).
3 When the Lamb opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature say, “Come!”
4 Then another horse came out, a fiery red one. Its rider was given power to take peace from the earth and to make people kill each other. To him was given a large sword:
(Despite the promises of peace from the antichrist, warfare will break out after this seal breaks. A red rider on a horse slays a great number of people.)
The sword is often a symbol of God's judgment. David writes in Psalm 7:12, "If [the wicked] does not turn back, He [God] will sharpen His sword." In Isaiah 34:6, 8, in the context of the Day of the Lord, God combines the sword of judgment with the idea of sacrifice and slaughter.
- Matthew 24:6-8 6 - You will hear of wars and rumors of wars, but see to it that you are not alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come. 7 Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be famines and earthquakes in various places. 8All these are the beginning of birth pains.
5 When the Lamb opened the third seal, I heard the third living creature say, “Come!” I looked, and there before me was a black horse! Its rider was holding a pair of scales in his hand:
(A rider on a black horse will spread famine throughout the earth. With whatever population is left on the earth after the warfare, they will have a meager survival; this describes a condition where basic goods are sold at greatly inflated prices. Thus, the black horse rider depicts times of deep scarcity or famine but not of starvation.)
6 Then I heard what sounded like a voice among the four living creatures, saying, “Two pounds of wheat for a day’s wages, and six pounds of barley for a day’s wages, and do not damage the oil and the wine!”
(War and famine give way to inflation due to supply and demand)
(Parallel)- Ezekiel 4:16- Then He told me, "Son of man, I am going to cut off the supply of food in Jerusalem. They will anxiously eat bread rationed by weight, and in despair they will drink water by measure.
- Matthew 24:7 - ...There will be famines and earthquakes in various places.
7 When the Lamb opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth living creature say, “Come!”
8 I looked, and there before me was a pale horse! Its rider was named Death, and Hades was following close behind him:
(Death and Hades, the unseen world, follow this fourth rider, claiming its victims. The damage this rider causes is staggering. One fourth of the world's population will die in this judgment. They fall victim to the sword, likely in civil war and infighting, starvation, pestilence, and savage animals)
They were given power over a fourth of the earth to kill by sword, famine and plague, and by the wild beasts of the earth:
(The Fourth Seal; "A Pale Horse" Or "Ashen", the Greek word from which the English word "chlorophyll' comes, describes the pale, ashen-green, pallor characteristic of the decomposition of a corpse. God grants this horseman the authority to bring death to 25% of the world's population).
- Luke 21:11 - There will be both great earthquakes, and famines and pestilences in different places. There will also be fearful sights and great signs from heaven.
- Jeremiah 14:12 - Although they may fast, I will not listen to their cry; although they may offer burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them. Instead, I will finish them off by sword and famine and plague."
- Ezekiel 5:17 - I will send famine and wild beasts against you, and they will leave you childless. Plague and bloodshed will sweep through you, and I will bring a sword against you. I, the LORD, have spoken."
9 When he opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain because of the word of God and the testimony they had maintained:
(So many churches have forgotten that persecution comes to the true believer. Many teach that if you are not living prosperously, both physically and spiritually, that you are not in right standing. That's certainly just not so, quite the opposite is true. We must be crucified with Christ. We must get our flesh under subjection).
- Rev 12:11 - They have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony. And they did not love their lives so as to shy away from death.
10 They called out in a loud voice, “How long, Sovereign Lord, holy and true, until you judge the inhabitants of the earth and avenge our blood?”
(Their cry was the same, in a sense, as the Christians who say, come quickly Lord Jesus).
- Luke 18:7,8 - And shall not God avenge his own elect, which cry day and night unto him, though He bear long with them?
- 2 Thess. 1:6-8: - It is a righteous thing with God to repay with tribulation those who trouble you," "and to give you who are troubled rest with us when the Lord Jesus is revealed from Heaven with His mighty angels," "in flaming fire taking vengeance on those who do not know God, and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.
- Deuteronomy 32:43 -…for He will avenge the blood of His children. He will take vengeance on His adversaries and repay those who hate Him…
11 Then each of them was given a white robe, (like the 24 elders) and they were told to wait a little longer, until the full number of their fellow servants, their brothers and sisters, were killed just as they had been:
(Rest yet for a little season": God will answer their prayer for vengeance, but in His time. God has predetermined the number of the righteous whose death He will allow before moving to destroy the rebels).
- 1 Thessalonians 4:16 - For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a loud command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will be the first to rise.
- Matthew 24-9 - "Then you will be handed over to be persecuted and put to death, and you will be hated by all nations because of me. 10 At that time many will turn away from the faith and will betray and hate each other, 11 and many false prophets will appear and deceive many people. 12 Because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow cold, 13 but the one who stands firm to the end will be saved. 14 And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.
- Rev 3:5 - All who are victorious will be clothed in white.
- 1 Thessalonians 4:13-14 - 13 But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. 14 For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep (first resurrection). 15 For this we declare to you by a word from the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep.
- 1 Corinthians 15:51-52 - Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed."
- 1 Corinthian 15:20 - But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep.
- 1 Cor 15:23 - But each in his own turn: Christ the firstfruits; then at His coming, those who belong to Him.
- Romans 8:11- And if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit, who lives in you.
12 I watched as he opened the sixth seal (time of wrath). There was a great earthquake. The sun turned black like sackcloth made of goat hair, the whole moon turned blood red:
(The moon became as blood": Accompanying the earthquake will be numerous volcanic eruptions; and large amounts of ash and debris will be blown into the earth's atmosphere, blackening the sun and giving the moon a blood-red hue (compare Zech. 14:6-7).
- Isaiah 13:10 - For the stars of heaven and their constellations will not give their light. The rising sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light.
- Joel 2:31- The sun will be turned to darkness and the moon to blood before the coming of the great and awesome day of the LORD.
13 and the stars in the sky fell to earth, as figs drop from a fig tree when shaken by a strong wind:
(Stars in the sky-possible meteor shower)
- Matthew 24:29 - Immediately after the tribulation of those days: 'The sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from the sky, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken
14 The heavens receded like a scroll being rolled up, and every mountain and island was removed from its place:
- Isaiah 34:4- All the stars of heaven will be dissolved. The skies will be rolled up like a scroll, and all their stars will fall like withered leaves from the vine, like foliage from the fig tree.
- Mark 13:24 - However, after the tribulation of those days, 'The sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light;
- Luke 21:24-25 - And Jerusalem will be trodden down by the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled. There will be signs in the sun and moon and stars, and on the earth dismay among the nations, bewildered by the roaring of the sea and the surging of the waves.
15 Then the kings of the earth, the princes, the generals, the rich, the mighty, and everyone else, both slave and free, hid in caves and among the rocks of the mountains (Middle East region):
- Isaiah 2:10- Go into the rocks and hide in the dust from the terror of the LORD and the splendor of His majesty.
- Isaiah 2:19- And they shall go into the holes of the rocks, and into the caves of the earth, for fear of the Lord, and for the glory of his majesty, when he ariseth to shake terribly the earth.
16 They called to the mountains and the rocks, “Fall on us and hide us[ from the face of Him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb!
- Isaiah 13:9 - Behold, the Day of the LORD is coming—cruel, with fury and burning anger—to make the earth a desolation and to destroy the sinners within it.
- Luke 21:26-27- Men will faint from fear and anxiety over what is coming upon the earth, for the powers of the heavens will be shaken…
- Isaiah 2:19- Men will flee to caves in the rocks and holes in the ground, away from the terror of the LORD and from the splendor of his majesty, when He rises to shake the earth.
- Luke 23:30 - At that time 'they will say to the mountains, "Fall on us!" and to the hills, "Cover us!"
17 For the great day of their wrath has come, and who can withstand it?”
(Great day) The sixth seal will commences what the prophets call "the Day of the Lord" (see Introduction to Joel).
(who can withstand it) The answer to that is "no one". The thing we must do is make sure that we are not left here to face all of these horrors. The way to assure that is by selling out to Jesus NOW. Make Him Lord of your life NOW before it is too late.