The Book of Revelation: Part 19, The Sixth Trumpet

Revelation 9:13-21 (BSB)

This week we are in chapter 9 and are about to read what happens when the sixth trumpet is sounded. After learning about the effects of the fifth trumpet, I understand if you’re worried about these trumpets. After all, remember how the eagle cried, “Woe! Woe! Woe to those who dwell on the earth, because of the trumpet blasts about to be sounded by the remaining three angels!” So, without further delay, let’s read what happens when the sixth is sounded.

Revelation 9:13-21 says:

13 Then the sixth angel sounded his trumpet, and I heard a voice from the four horns of the golden altar before God 

14 saying to the sixth angel with the trumpet, “Release the four angels who are bound at the great river Euphrates.”

15 So the four angels who had been prepared for this hour and day and month and year were released to kill a third of mankind. 

16 And the number of mounted troops was two hundred million; I heard their number.

17 Now the horses and riders in my vision looked like this: The riders had breastplates the colors of fire, sapphire, and sulfur. The heads of the horses were like the heads of lions, and out of their mouths proceeded fire, smoke, and sulfur. 

18 A third of mankind was killed by the three plagues of fire, smoke, and sulfur that proceeded from their mouths. 

19 For the power of the horses was in their mouths and in their tails; indeed, their tails were like snakes, having heads with which to inflict harm.

20 Now the rest of mankind who were not killed by these plagues still did not repent of the works of their hands. They did not stop worshiping demons and idols of gold, silver, bronze, stone, and wood, which cannot see or hear or walk.

 21 Furthermore, they did not repent of their murder, sorcery, sexual immorality, and theft.

Before we go back through these verses and look at them one at a time, I want to point out something significant we should remember about when the first four trumpets sounded: 1/3 of the earth and plants were burned up; 1/3 of the sea turned to blood, killing 1/3 of sea creatures and destroying 1/3 of ships; 1/3 of the fresh water was made bitter; and 1/3 of the sun, moon, and stars were darkened. Now, after the sixth trumpet is sounded, 1/3 of all people are killed. The consistent use of 1/3 must be significant, and so I don’t know if the 1/3 is to be taken literally as a specific amount, or if the greater point is that God is restraining the amount of destruction or death that is allowed to take place.

As we’ve seen, God’s restraint has been consistent all throughout His judgments. After the fifth trumpet was sounded, an army of locusts was released out of the abyss and given permission to torment people for “five months,” but God did not allow the locusts to harm His people who were marked with the seal on their foreheads. Now, after the sixth trumpet is sounded, God’s restraint is still being shown. I think this is important to keep in mind.

Let’s go back and read this section again. Starting with verse 13, it says, “Then the sixth angel sounded his trumpet, and I heard a voice from the four horns of the golden altar before God.”

If we aren’t familiar with how the Jewish tabernacles or temples were set up, this could be challenging to understand. But I think I can help demystify these “four horns.” In the Old Testament tabernacles and temples, the golden altar was the altar of incense, and according to God’s instructions in building it, the four horns of the golden altar were horns that were placed on the four corners of the altar. They are not horns of animals or instruments; they are simply raised corners on the four corners of the altar.

Their purpose was not just decorative, though. Exodus 30:10 tells us that “Once a year Aaron shall make atonement on the horns of the altar. Throughout your generations he shall make atonement on it annually with the blood of the sin offering of atonement. The altar is most holy to the LORD.”

On this altar of incense, once a year, animal blood was to be applied to the horns by the priests as atonement. At all other times, as Exodus 30:7 tells us, the priest was to “burn fragrant incense on it every morning when he tends the lamps.”

We know that incense represents the prayers of God’s people. So, to me, this seems like more evidence that these seven trumpets being sounded are still the result of the seventh seal being opened. Because if you remember, when the Lamb first opened the seventh seal, after the half an hour of silence, then a golden censor was filled with fire from the altar and hurled to the earth. That action seemed to represent that God heard the prayers of His people and was responding by sending righteous judgment on the earth.

Now, if John is still describing the effects of the seventh seal being opened, these seven trumpets are initiating seven different events, and this sixth trumpet is no different. It’s showing us still more of God’s response to the cries of His people. I think the fact that John begins by telling us about the four horns on the altar is a clue that this is all being done in response to prayer.

John says that he “heard a voice from the four horns” speak. Because of the way this is worded, some, like the Benson Commentary, seem to think the horns spoke. It says, “Such a voice, proceeding from the four horns of the golden altar, is a strong indication of the divine displeasure; and plainly intimates, that the sins of men must have been very great, when the altar, which was their sanctuary and protection, called aloud for vengeance.”

It could be, because this is a vision after all, but because the horns are on the altar, which is in front of the throne of God, it seems reasonable that the voice John heard was God’s.

If it was not God Himself speaking, whoever it was who spoke had authority, because then verse 14 tells us that the voice he heard was “saying to the sixth angel with the trumpet, ‘Release the four angels who are bound at the great river Euphrates.’”

For sure, given the scope of the destruction that happens, the sins of people must have been very great for these angels to be called into action. And because they were “bound,” I think we can assume they are fallen angels.

I say that because this is a term that we only see applied to fallen angels, and not to God’s angels. This word is used many times in the New Testament, and it can mean physical restraints or binding covenants. And only in Revelation is it used to speak of angels and the Devil being bound, but the concept of fallen angels being bound is seen elsewhere in the Bible, too. For example, Jude 1:6 (BLB) says, “And the angels not having kept their domain, but having abandoned their own dwelling, He has kept in eternal chains under gloomy darkness unto the judgment of the great day.”

Without getting into all the different speculations and opinions, many theologians agree that demons are bound to specific locations. That makes sense to me, because God is still ruler over all of them, and He can limit what they are allowed to do and when.

And now, verse 15 tells us what they were released to do. It says, “So the four angels who had been prepared for this hour and day and month and year were released to kill a third of mankind.”

Some theologians have spent a great deal of time considering what this mention of time might mean. For example, just like Barnes considered the 5 months of the fifth trumpet to equal 150 days and “the Arabian hordes under the guidance of Muhammed and his successors,” he also states about this sixth trumpet that, “The fair interpretation, therefore, will require us to find some events that will fill up the period of about 391 years.”

I’ve included this opinion because it’s always possible that Barnes and others like him are correct. But I’m not sure it’s that complicated. It seems to me that by saying that the “four angels who had been prepared for this hour and day and month and year” simply means that this time is known to God, and it’s a specific time in history; it’s probably not an event that is repeated.

And it’s a very good thing this was (or will be) a onetime event, because the angels “were released to kill a third of mankind.”

Before we get into why they are going to do this, we should ask how they are going to do this. The following verses tell us. Starting with verse 16, it says, “And the number of mounted troops was two hundred million; I heard their number.”

Now depending on the translation, this number changes, but that’s with good reason. In the Greek it says, “dismyriades myriads.” According to scholars, a myriad was the Greek term for ten thousand. So, some translations say, “twice ten thousand ten thousand.” If you do some math and multiply ten thousand times ten thousand, you get one hundred million. Twice that would be 200 hundred million.

If everyone is correct about what a myriad is, then two hundred million is a very large number. John knows it’s a lot; maybe that’s why he explains that he heard the number. 

To help us understand just how large a number this is, the largest military in the world is China’s. They claim to have 2 million soldiers. That’s only one percent of the army John saw.

Two hundred million is larger than most countries’ populations. In fact, only seven countries have populations over two hundred million. The United States has almost three hundred and fifty million people, which makes it the third most populated. 200 million mounted troops is a number that is simply unfathomable to accurately picture.  Like John stated—the only way he knew it was that many was because he heard the number.

Also, this extraordinary number of mounted troops was no ordinary group of horses and riders. Verse 17 says, “Now the horses and riders in my vision looked like this: The riders had breastplates the colors of fire, sapphire, and sulfur. The heads of the horses were like the heads of lions, and out of their mouths proceeded fire, smoke, and sulfur.”

I wonder if, because what he is writing is so beyond the ordinary, John wanted to make sure and mention again that this is a vision he is seeing. Unfortunately, beyond their multicolored breastplates, John does not give us any description as to what the riders looked like. But horses with heads like lions which breathe out fire, smoke, and sulfur is like a lot of what John has been describing—it’s rather difficult to picture.

The fire, smoke and sulfur must have been especially toxic, though, because verse 18 tells us that “A third of mankind was killed by the three plagues of fire, smoke, and sulfur that proceeded from their mouths.”

This woe is yet far greater than the first woe.

As catastrophic as this would be though, because there is a limit to this judgment, we know this event is not the final judgment when Jesus returns: Only a third of all humans are killed by these three plagues. That’s not to say that number is small. If this judgment took place today, 1/3 of today’s global population of roughly 8.2 billion people would mean that 2.7 billion people would die. That is almost the amount of both India and China’s total populations combined.

But if this judgement had taken place in the 14th century, when, for example, the Black Plague happened, the number of deaths was far less because of the smaller global population. Historians estimate that between 30 and 60 percent of all people died, depending on the location. At minimum, the Black Plague killed a third of the European population, and it’s possible it killed a third of all people around the world as the plague spread globally. It’s hard to know for sure, though, because it was not documented very well.

My point in this bleak discussion is that we shouldn’t be quick to assume this vision of what happened after the sixth trumpet sounded hasn’t happened yet. At the same time, we shouldn’t assume it has.

In some ways, we have more questions than answers. And just like the locusts after the fifth trumpet sounded, it’s impossible to know for sure if these descriptions are literal or symbolic. But before we draw any conclusions, let’s read what else John mentions.

Verse 19 says about the horses with lion-like heads: “For the power of the horses was in their mouths and in their tails; indeed, their tails were like snakes, having heads with which to inflict harm.”

That adds complication, doesn’t it?

Just as it seems to be impossible to know just when this happened or will happen, it also seems impossible to know which of these descriptions John mentions are supposed to be understood literally. To start with, is this an army of 200 million soldiers, riding some sort of chimera animal, or is it modern military machinery, which John had no words to describe? Is it one army, or is the 200 million the total of all the armies who fight each other at that time? Or is this army not an army of human soldiers at all, but an army of demons who have been released to kill?

And that last question is important because what if this army isn’t demonic? What if it’s an army of angels? The fire and bright colors could apply to an army of the Lord. For example, in 2 Kings 6:17, it says, “Then Elisha prayed, ’O LORD, please open his eyes that he may see.’ And the LORD opened the eyes of the young man, and he saw that the hills were full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha.”

Again, it causes us to ask, which side are the myriads of soldiers on? Because remember what John told us in Revelation 5:11. It said, “Then I looked, and I heard the voices of many angels encircling the throne, and the living creatures and the elders. And their number was myriads of myriads and thousands of thousands.”

Most commentators do not try to come up with a finite mathematical equation for the number of angels encircling the throne, so why people do for chapter 9 seems very inconsistent to me. If we are going to say that here in chapter 9, the twice myriad myriad is equal to 200 million, then shouldn’t we try to mathematically work out the “myriads of myriads and thousands of thousands”? We should treat them consistently. At the very least, we should note that those angels before God’s throne do not include all of God’s angels. Those are only the ones before His throne. So, I think it’s safe to conclude that God’s angels far outnumber this mounted army of soldiers, whoever they are.

But a question you might have is this: Are the servants of God who are wearing seals on their foreheads exempt from being killed? Are they being spared the same way they were spared when the locusts attacked? It doesn’t actually say. I think we should assume that they are not spared, because if they had been, I think John would have mentioned it.

John told us that he saw under the altar the souls of those who had been martyred, so we know that God’s servants aren’t always kept from harm. In fact, the New Testament writers spend quite a bit of time warning us that death is a possible outcome for followers of Jesus. And for that matter, so did Jesus. He said in Matthew 10:28-31, “Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Instead, fear the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell. Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from the will of your Father. And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. So do not be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.”

Luke 12:4-5 adds even more information about what Jesus said when He spoke those words. It says, “I tell you, My friends, do not be afraid of those who kill the body and after that can do no more. But I will show you whom you should fear: Fear the One who, after you have been killed, has authority to throw you into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear Him!”

For sure, John’s vision has been showing us just how much authority God has: it extends over all things. And we are right to be afraid.

But that brings us to what I think is the key verse of this passage. It tells us why God caused these four bound angels to be released and cause all this death. Verse 20 says, “Now the rest of mankind who were not killed by these plagues still did not repent of the works of their hands. They did not stop worshiping demons and idols of gold, silver, bronze, stone, and wood, which cannot see or hear or walk.”

These horrible disasters and terrible events were all allowed to happen so that people might repent. But remarkably, they did not. Verse 21 adds, “Furthermore, they did not repent of their murder, sorcery, sexual immorality, and theft.”

What will it take to make people repent? Even after seeing all the death and destruction after these trumpets have sounded was not enough to make them repent. The people still kept up their sins. John lists five in particular: idol worship, murder, sorcery, sexual immorality, and theft. These sins have been a plague on people since the beginning of time after Adam and Eve sinned.

Why haven’t people repented from these sins? Going back to the text in Jude, let’s read it in context because Jude 1:4-7 & 14-16 is so appropriate to this vision in Revelation and helps answer that question. It says: “Certain men have crept in among you unnoticed—ungodly ones who were designated long ago for condemnation. They turn the grace of our God into a license for immorality, and they deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ. Although you are fully aware of this, I want to remind you that after Jesus had delivered His people out of the land of Egypt, He destroyed those who did not believe. And the angels who did not stay within their own domain but abandoned their proper dwelling—these He has kept in eternal chains under darkness, bound for judgment on that great day. In like manner, Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities around them, who indulged in sexual immorality and pursued strange flesh, are on display as an example of those who sustain the punishment of eternal fire. Enoch, the seventh from Adam, also prophesied about them: ‘Behold, the Lord is coming with myriads of His holy ones to execute judgment on everyone, and to convict all the ungodly of every ungodly act of wickedness and every harsh word spoken against Him by ungodly sinners.’ These men are discontented grumblers, following after their own lusts; their mouths spew arrogance; they flatter others for their own advantage.”

In this same way, we have certain people who have crept in among us Christians today. They have turned the grace of our God into a license to sin. They tell people that sin does not matter. These trumpets are a warning. God will not let sin go unpunished. All the sins and atrocities that humans have committed against others—He’s not going to let evil go unpunished. He would not be a just God if He did not respond to the injustice that has been done. As John told us, there are souls under the altar in the throne room, and God has promised them that they would be avenged. He will execute judgment.

But look at the depth of God’s great mercy and patience. Even His allowing or directly causing these judgments to happen is an effort to get people to repent of their sin. It’s exactly what Peter talks about in 2 Peter 3:8-9, which says: “Beloved, do not let this one thing escape your notice: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. The Lord is not slow in keeping His promise as some understand slowness, but is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish but everyone to come to repentance.” God is not only righteous and just—He is also merciful and forgiving.

But that is not the end of what Peter says. 2 Peter 3:10-13 warns us: “But the Day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar, the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and its works will be laid bare. Since everything will be destroyed in this way, what kind of people ought you to be? You ought to conduct yourselves in holiness and godliness as you anticipate and hasten the coming of the day of God, when the heavens will be destroyed by fire and the elements will melt in the heat. But in keeping with God’s promise, we are looking forward to a new heaven and a new earth, where righteousness dwells.”

Not to give a spoiler, but I think we all know this already—in Revelation 20:10, we will see that the Devil will be thrown in a lake of fire and sulfur. Which, not coincidently, are two of the things that proceed out of the lion-like heads of the horses. Before that happens, the Lord will come like a thief and all will be laid bare.

In light of all this, what kind of person ought we be?

Peter says we ought to conduct ourselves in holiness and godliness. In the beginning of Revelation, in the letters to the churches, that is the same message Jesus wanted John to tell each of them. So, for sure, we ought to examine ourselves and see how we are conducting ourselves. And a good place to start is with those five sins that John just mentioned.

We should ask ourselves:

1.     Have I turned anything into an idol? If anything is more important to me than Jesus is, that person or thing is an idol. As Jesus said in Matthew 6:24, “No one can serve two masters: Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.”

2.     Have I committed murder? This is not limited to the act of physically killing someone. As 1 John 3:15 warns us, “Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that eternal life does not reside in a murderer.”

3.     Am I practicing any sort of sorcery? The Greek word for sorcery is pharmakeia, so in other words, am I altering my mind or putting my faith in something outside of the Lord? Anytime we seek guidance from outside God’s Word, we are practicing sorcery. Instead, as James 1:5 says, “Now if any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him.”

4.     Am I committing sexual immorality? This is not limited to sinful actions. This sin begins in what we allow our eyes to see and our minds to imagine. As Jesus explained in Matthew 5:27-29, “You have heard that it was said, ‘Do not commit adultery.’ But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman to lust after her has already committed adultery with her in his heart. If your right eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell.”

5.     Am I committing theft? We should not steal, but this would also include cheating people out of money owed to them. As Jesus said in Matthew 7:12, “In everything, then, do to others as you would have them do to you. For this is the essence of the Law and the Prophets.”

If you examine yourself and find any of that to be true, it is not too late. Repent, stop sinning, and turn to the Lord. He will forgive you and empower you by the Holy Spirit to walk in truth and righteousness. By His grace, He promises to enable us to follow Him. If we do that, we can be confident that because of our faith in Jesus Christ, we can endure anything that happens between now and when Jesus returns.

There may be myriads and myriads of armies we must face, but there are myriads and myriads of angels at the Lord’s disposal to come to our aid. Let us pray that the Lord gives us eyes of faith to trust in what we cannot see. For the same Lamb who died on the Cross for our sins is the same Lamb who is opening these seals and limiting what evil can do. Let us place our faith and trust in His love for us, conducting ourselves in holiness and godliness.

Prayer: Heavenly Father, we are so thankful that You love us. Thank You for sending us Jesus so that the sins we have committed are wiped away by what He did for us on the Cross. Thank You that we do not have to be afraid of those who might kill our bodies, for we know that when we die, we will go to be with You. Please fill us with courage and help us to grow in our knowledge and love of You so that we may walk in righteousness. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.