The Merciful Harvest

This series of posts is my attempt to demonstrate that the language of the Revelation was actually symbolic code that was very intelligible to a first-century Jewish Christian living in the Roman Empire.  I’m re-writing the Revelation to communicate the same message, but to a twenty-first century American Christian audience, using symbols we understand.  This particular section parallels Revelation chapter 14.  If you want to catch up, here’s a PDF of the entire series so far: The Revelation to JR – Chapters 1-14.

Next I saw another angel flying through the stratosphere – it proclaimed Good News to every person on the planet (every nation, ethnicity, language and people group, now and throughout all of human history).  He announced loudly,

Fear God and give God glory, because it’s finally time for God’s judgment.  Worship the One who created the entire universe – everything from stars and galaxies to atoms and quarks.  The sky, earth, salt and fresh water.

A second angel followed the first.  It said,

Defeated!  The great Babylon is defeated!  She has made all the peoples of the world drink her juice (which is really the consequences of her unfaithfulness).

A third angel followed the second.  He announced loudly,

The people who worship the Beast or its image (on TV) – anyone who received its mark on their hearts or wallets – all of them will also drink the juice of God’s wrath.  The wine is poured undiluted (it’s 160 proof!) straight into the cup of God’s anger.  They’ll be punished with fire and burning sulfur in front of the Lamb and the holy angels.  The smoke from their punishment rises into the sky forever and ever.  It’ll be 24/7 – the people who worship the Beast and its image and receive its mark won’t get a break.

Saints – if you keep God’s commandments and hold to the faith of Jesus – pay attention!  This is a reminder for you to stick it out and stay faithful!

Then I heard a voice from heaven say,

Write this down: “Anyone who dies from now on and believes in God is fortunate.  The Spirit agrees, ‘They’ll get to retire from their work because what they’ve done speaks for itself.’”

I looked and saw a white cloud, with someone sitting on it.  But it wasn’t an angel with a harp.  It was someone like the Son of Man.  He was wearing a gold medal and was driving a combine.  Another angel came out of God’s Temple, and yelled to the one on the cloud,

Put the combine in gear and start harvesting.  It’s harvest time and the earth’s harvest is ripe.

So the one on the cloud dropped the combine into gear and drove it over the earth, and harvested the whole round ball.  Then another angel came out of God’s Temple (in heaven), and he also drove a combine.  One more angel came out of the altar (it was the one that commands fire), and he yelled to the angel in the combine,

Put your combine in gear and harvest the earth’s vineyards – the grapes are ripe and it’s time!

So the angel drove his combine over the earth, gathered the grapes and tossed them into the great Welches factory of God’s wrath.  The Welches factory (it was outside the city) crushed the grapes to get their juice, and blood flowed from the Welches factory deep enough to cover a doorway, and covered the earth from East to West.