Lesson 11, March 9-15
Sabbath Afternoon
Read for This Week’s Study: Revelation 15:1; Revelation 7:1-3; Revelation 14:9-10; Revelation 16:1-12; Revelation 17:1; Daniel 5; Revelation 16:16; 2 Thessalonians 2:9-12.
Memory Text: “Who shall not fear You, O Lord, and glorify Your name? For You alone are holy. For all nations shall come and worship before You, for Your judgments have been manifested” (Revelation 15:4, NKJV).
Revelation 11:18 summarizes events on earth right before the battle of Armageddon: “The nations were angry”. This state of affairs on earth matches Jesus’ description of the last days (Luke 21:25) and is followed by God’s wrath, which are His judgments in the form of the seven last plagues upon the unrepentant (Revelation 15:1).
Revelation 15 opens with the picture of seven angels with seven bowls filled with this divine wrath. But before this outpouring happens, we have a future glimpse of God’s faithful people (Revelation 15:1-4). They are described as victorious “over the beast, over his image and over his mark and over the number of his name” (Revelation 15:2, NKJV), as they stand on something resembling a sea of glass and sing the song of Moses and the Lamb - all images reminiscent of the Hebrews on the shores of the Red Sea, celebrating God’s victory over the Egyptians (Exodus 15).
These victorious saints are the same ones referred to as the 144,000 in Revelation 14:1-5. Having refused the mark of the beast, they are protected from the seven last plagues. Then, at the Second Advent their mortal bodies are transformed and clothed with immortality (1 Corinthians 15:51-54), and they will join the resurrected saints when Jesus comes in power and glory (1 Thessalonians 4:17).
