Revelation 9:13-21 Trumpet 6

Verse 13-14 "And the sixth angel sounded, and I heard a voice from the four horns of the golden altar which is before God, saying to the sixth angel which had the trumpet, Loose the four angels which are bound in the great river Euphrates."


This time a voice sounds from the four horns of the altar before God. Since God is not speaking, one is justified in assuming it is probably Christ who is giving this instruction. For some reason the sounding of the trumpet is not enough this time to set this in motion. This group was bound in the river Euphrates. There were two Euphrates rivers in scripture. One existed before the flood and was to the best of our knowledge destroyed by the flood in the upheaval. The other came into existence after the flood. It would seem more likely that it is referring to the one that exists now, although they could be bound where the original Euphrates once existed. It would depend upon when they were bound. The probability though, since Christ is referencing the river and it would have no significance as a reference if it were the antediluvian river location, is that it is the present Euphrates. God releases these fallen angels who are allowed to take their vengeance and anger out on man. There are only four bound at this site, but as we will see in the next few verses, they will have an army of two hundred million. One assumes that maybe they were ringleaders.

Verse 15 “And the four angels were loosed, which were prepared for an hour, and a day, and a month, and a year, for to slay the third part of men.”

These four fallen angels were prepared for just this moment. I have seen this verse interpreted to be a period of thirteen months, one day, and one hour, as it was taken to mean a year, plus a month, plus a day, plus an hour. Personally I do not think that is how this should be taken. I read it as saying that they were prepared for a particular hour that would come on a particular day, month, and year. They were prepared for this one particular moment and time in history. I find it a little peculiar to say that something was prepared for a length of time that amounts to thirteen months, one day, and one hour. One might accept the thirteen months, as the previous trumpet lasted five, but to say that it will go on an extra day, and then an extra hour? That seems a little bizarre. It seems much more intelligible if one accepts it as meaning one particular moment in time.

This group will do more than torture. They will kill fully one third of all the people on the planet. Currently with 6.8 billion people, that amounts to roughly 2.3 billion. That is if there were that many people left at this point. There will not be. As we do not know how much of the first four seals were included in the 70th week, we will consider that the reduction of the population in earnest began with martyrdom. The group of martyrs that John sees appearing suddenly out of the tribulation is a great multitude that no man could number. That lowered the population quite a bit. Then there was the sixth seal, plus the first four trumpets. There is no doubt many died from that. If we were to assume (and that is all it is, an assumption) that all of the previous seals and trumpets have reduced the population by one fourth, which I believe to be a conservative estimate considering what has happened, it would be down to 5.1 billion. To reduce it by another third would bring it down to 3.4 billion. That brings it down to roughly one half of what it was originally. These numbers are just guesses, there is nothing to back them up. It could be more than that (most likely probability) or less. We only know that one third of whatever number there is will die during this trumpet. If half the population has expired by the time this happens, it will reduce the population to 2.3 billion, one third of the original population.

Verse 16 “And the number of the army of the horsemen were two hundred thousand thousand: and I heard the number of them.”

This group of four have an army suddenly appear out of nowhere We are not told from where they come. We are also not told if this army is made up of fallen angels, or left-over nephilim that were not all killed off in Biblical times and have been procreating their own population in a location unknown to us. Remember that these nephilim would have advanced technology and powers due to their hybrid angelic DNA intelligence and abilities. The number of the army amounts to two hundred million. That is a huge army. If each “soldier” were to kill five hundred people, that would amount to 1 billion people. One thousand each would be 2 billion. So each one of these horsemen will have to kill quite a few people, which given their abilities will not be hard.

Verse 17-18 “And thus I saw the horses in the vision, and them that sat on them, having breastplates of fire, and of jacinth, and brimstone: and the heads of the horses were as the heads of lions; and out of their mouths issued fire and smoke and brimstone. By these three was the third part of men killed, by the fire, and by the smoke, and by the brimstone, which issued out of their mouths.”

It would appear that there might be two groups here, the riders and the horses, unless the riders are part of the horses, such as the mythical centaur, who had the upper half of a man attached to the body of a horse. This verse would seem to indicate two entities, but as these creatures are not like anything seen before, anything is possible. It appears that the riders by themselves are not important, if they are separate from the beast they ride, as the beast has all the power. Beginning with the riders, they have on breastplates of fire, jacinth, and brimstone. These breastplates seem to be flaming and sulphurous. They reek of having come straight from hell or at least give the impression that they are from someplace that certainly resembles it. A jacinth is a zircon of differing reddish hues. The breastplates must have had a reddish gemstone-like quality about them.

The horses, as John refers to them for lack of any other word, have heads similar to lions. However, these lion heads have remarkable powers. They can shoot forth from their mouth fire, smoke, and brimstone. While both riders and horses are described with the words fire and brimstone, the Greek words are not identical. The ones used to describe the horses implies actual fire and sulphur (brimstone). The ones used to describe the riders implies fire-like, and sulphur-like. Smoke also pours out of the lions’ mouths. That would seem to be a given, since fire proceeds out of their mouths also. These three things kill people. They die by burning from the flames, asphyxiation from the smoke, and being poisoned by the sulphuric gas.

Verse 19 “For their power is in their mouth, and in their tails: for their tails were like unto serpents, and had heads, and with them they do hurt.”

As if the other three things were not enough, now people have to worry about the other end of the beast. They have tails, but what tails. The tails have what is like a serpent’s head on the end which would strike at people and apparently bite them, as they are compared to a serpent, which does bite. Ugly looking beasts. Not to mention lethal. It would seem that it would not be all that hard for them to kill so many people apiece. Again it is probable, actually more than probable, that the world will see this as an alien invasion. These creatures are clearly not earth creatures, and most people do not believe in demons or fallen angels, but many believe in aliens. Added to that is the probable scenario that the governments will tell people this is an alien invasion. Think back to what President Reagan said about how if we were invaded by something from outer space how people would finally put their differences aside to unite in a world government to fight the threat. Do they know something they are not telling us? We will discuss that possibility much later.

Verse 20-21 “And the rest of the men which were not killed by these plagues yet repented not of the works of their hands, that they should not worship devils, and idols of gold, and silver, and brass, and stone, and of wood: which neither can see, nor hear, nor walk: Neither repented they of their murders, nor of their sorceries, nor of their fornication, nor of their thefts.”

There are still a fair number of people surviving all this as improbable as it seems. But just as God said He would send a delusion that they might not believe the truth, so these people do not repent of their sins. They worship devils, which they have made images of in gold, silver, brass, stone, and wood (depending on their financial ability). Idols which will not save them as they can neither see, hear, or move. Neither will they repent of their other sins of murder, witchcraft and drug use (the Greek word implies both possibilities), sexual sins, and theft. One can assume, as we have seen with events such as Katrina, that when there is some sort of horrible catastrophe, there are those who riot, loot, and even kill. Considering what the world will have gone through up to this point, one can only imagine how completely out of control society has become in relation to this sort of activity. People will do anything to survive. Sexual sins are so prevalent these days that it is hard to believe it could become worse. Witchcraft is ever on the rise as is drug use. These things will not change even in the face of the end of the world. People are amazing, and totally depraved.

The sixth trumpet judgment has now passed. The second woe is over. Giving a preview of things to come before getting to them in the scriptures, we will see that this is the end of the conditions on the seventh seal that Satan demanded. These conditions have been written on the seals since the fall of man, and have been available for everyone to read, as mortgages and legal agreements were always available to the public in the temple. Now Satan's reign is over. He is no longer the prince and power of the air. Antichrist's reign is also over. Christ is now in total and complete control as the one and only king of this earth. It is owned by Him and He can now claim it and do as He pleases with it, as He alone reigns. In Daniel 7 we learned that antichrist would be given control for time, times, and half a time, or 3 1/2 years. As we will see, the 3 1/2 years are over as far as antichrist's reign is concerned. But 3 1/2 years is a general length of time that is not quite specific. When we speak of 3 1/2 years, we could mean three years and five months, or three years and seven months. It is a figure that could be rounded off. As we continue, we will soon see that God further specifies that the length of time antichrist is allowed to reign is forty-two months. But again, is that forty-two months precisely or forty-two months plus or minus a week or a day or two? It will be seen that this time is further delineated as being 1260 days. That specificity will help us to exactly figure out certain events. In the meanwhile, it is necessary to jump ahead of ourselves and present these two new time factors before we actually run into them so that it can be understood that we have reached the end not only of the 3 1/2 years, but the forty-two months, and the 1260 days. It will become clear why we need to understand that presently. As we have reached the end of the 1260 days, (this will be seen shortly) Satan's and antichrist's rule has come to an end. But what about all the rest of what is written in Revelation? Well, if you remember, in Daniel 12 we are told that from the time of the abomination of desolation there will be two other number of days. There will be 1290 days to the end of all or, as we would consider it, the entire apocalypse or 70th week, and then 1335 days until a blessing. These numbers will help us to organize all of this information that follows.