Truth Matters - Weekend, 1

This is Andy Thomas from the Masculine Journey Podcast where we discover what it means to be a wholehearted man. Your chosen Truth Network Podcast is starting in just seconds. Enjoy it, share it, but most of all, thank you for listening and for choosing the Truth Podcast Network. This week, Dr. Davis has been discussing the opening of the bottomless pit, the abyss, and the repercussions that follow. Learn more about the ministry of the Truth Project at www.projecttruthmatters.com.

And let's join Dr. Cheryl Davis for this week's extended edition of Truth Matters. Satan is given permission to open the bottomless pit. When he does, the sky is darkened by smoke that pours forth from it. So let's talk about the bottomless pit, and we know this to be the abyss. First, this is a place dreaded by demons, and we know that based on Luke chapter 8 verse 31.

And if you remember, this is when Jesus sailed over the sea to the other side and landed in the area of the Gadarenes. And he sees a man that is bound and cannot live in society, and he has a legion of demons. And when he releases him and sets him free, the demons say, please do not send us to that place. And in chapter 8 verse 31, it says, and they begged him that he would not command them to go into the abyss. The abyss, or the bottomless pit, is a place where demons even dread to go.

So if the demons of hell do not want to go to the bottomless pit, how bad must it be? We also know the bottomless pit to be a place where angels are retained, and we know that in Jude verse 6. And the angels who did not keep their proper domain, but left their own abode, he has reserved in everlasting chains under darkness for the judgment of the great day. Angels who rebelled against God have been assigned to the abyss until their judgment and permanent casting into the everlasting fire. And Matthew 25 41 references this, then he will also say to those on the left hand, depart from me, you curse into the everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels.

So he already has that prepared for those that have permanently rebelled against God. The abyss is also known, or the bottomless pit is also known as a place where Jesus Christ went to preach. The abyss is the place where Jesus Christ preached between his death and resurrection. He went there to proclaim victory over death to the fallen angels. You know, we had a discussion about this at my church to say, did he preach to them to give them an option for salvation?

No, once you've already died and past that great golf chasm fix that is mentioned in the Bible that you can no longer repent. But in this case, Jesus is preaching victory over death in the abyss for Christ also suffered once for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God being put to death in the flesh, but made alive by the spirit by whom also he went and preached to the spirits in prison. So this is evidence he went there to proclaim victory over death.

He did not preach the gospel to them. Like I said, he went to announce that he was going to be victorious over death. Basically, in my own words, it's heads up, I'm going to rise on the third day, I have victory you lose. And fourth, the bottomless pit is the place that is ultimately controlled by Jesus Christ. You know, and I know that we may not think of this this way. But if you notice in this chapter, he was given the key to him was given the key to the bottomless pit. The key to the bottomless pit was given to Satan by Jesus Christ. That means that he does not have control or access over the abyss. Jesus has the keys of Hades and death.

And we know that going back to chapter one of Revelation verse 18. He gives the keys to Satan as to unleash demonic power in the last part of the Great Tribulation. A key point to remember in all of our understanding about the world as we know it is that God is in control. Even he is in control of the demons. Satan, demons and evil are on a leash which is ultimately held by the hand of God. If he did not restrain the power of evil in the world, the human race would have self-destructed many millennia ago. The last years of the Great Tribulation is a period of intense judgment on the human race. These evil forces are let loose.

God extends the leash further than it has ever been extended before. And I think that we need to fully understand that. I want to drive this point home in the fact that he opens the bottomless pit to unleash Satan as a tool of judgment. And we will see evil, or those that are not saved that are living in the tribulation will see evil much greater than we've ever witnessed here. And I don't think that we have a full understanding of the depravity of man. I don't think we have a full understanding of how much the Holy Spirit restrains evil today. We do not know what we do not know. We think that, well, there are severe things, but it's really not going to get worse than what I've lived through.

Hell is much worse than what we live through here. But next I'd like to talk more about this smoke that is arising out of the pit, so much that it darkened the sun and the air. And this represents the unleashed power of the pit.

It really has a two-fold importance. One is the unleashed power of the pit. First, Jesus describes hell as a place where the fire never goes out. And we know this in Mark chapter 9 verse 48, where the worm does not die and the fire is not quenched. This is confirmed again in Luke chapter 3 verse 17. His winnowing fan is in his hand and he will thoroughly clean out his threshing floor and gather the wheat into his barn.

But the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire. And again we see that demons are pictured as locusts coming up out of the pit, which can appear as a huge cloud of smoke when they swarm by the millions. We know these are not real literal locusts because God promised never to release swarms of locusts in Egypt after the plagues.

And we see that promise in Exodus chapter 10 verse 14. And the locusts went up all over the land of Egypt and rested on all the territory of Egypt. They were very severe. There had been no such locusts as they, nor shall there be such after them. So these aren't real locusts. These are just figurative locusts in that the demons appear like locusts.

So we know that these are not literal locusts. They're just used figuratively to describe the demons. The demons had a number of unusual characteristics. So one, I would like to say that they are imperial creatures, meaning that they were shaped like horses prepared for battle.

Primarily today, horses are viewed just as a mode of transportation and for pleasure. But in biblical times, they were a strong tool of war. The demons are coming out prepared for battle. Second, these demons look to be invulnerable creatures. They have golden like crowns on their head in verse seven.

They're going forth with the intent to win the battle. And they are intelligent creatures. And we know that because the Bible says that they have faces like men which speak of their intelligence.

And they are highly organized, intelligent forces of evil. The locust hair is said to be like a woman's hair. And this speaks of seductiveness. In the ancient world, a woman's hair was a tool of seduction. The locusts will have seductive skills in accomplishing their goals.

And what I mean by seductive skills is that they will be easy to influence those to follow them, to judge them. And they are very cunning. They are inhuman creatures saying that they have lion like teeth, speak of their power, their ability to rip and destroy their prey, much like lions do. They have armor like iron, meaning they were indestructible. Demons are only vulnerable to the name and power of Jesus Christ.

They have been cooped up for thousands and thousands of years. But when the demons burst forth, they will swarm like pouring rain. You know, if you hear a thunderstorm and hear pouring rain and there's tin on your roof, it sounds like hell is hitting your house.

It's not always. It's big drops of rain. Demons will pour out of the bottomless pit much like this. So these demons are going to do significant damage. Their damage will be painful. In verse 10, it talks about their sting will be like the sting of a scorpion. Their damage will be protracted. And what I mean by protracted is that it will continue to last.

It will not stop. In chapter 9 verses 5 and 10, it tells us that it will last five months. Their power is not to kill, but to torment.

Many will experience severe pain so much to the point that they will request death, but they cannot find death. Their damage will also be personal. And we know that in verse 4, the attack upon those who are not the elect of God. If you've got to remember, the 144,000 Jewish evangelists are excluded, as are the Jews and Gentiles they have won to Christ. This attack will be personally to those who do not have the seal of God on their foreheads, as it says in verse 4. Revelation 22 verse 4 indicates that in the heavenly city, those who are the Lord's will have his name on their foreheads. And lastly, their damage will be perpetual. In Revelation chapter 9 verse 6, man will seek death and will not find it. They will desire to die and death will flee from them. And these first set of verses is that they'll have an unscrupulous prince, and that prince is known as the angel from the bottomless pit whose name in Hebrew is Abaddon.

In his Greek name, it is Apollyon. One woe is past. Behold, two more woes are coming after these things. This is the devil. The unscrupulous prince is the devil, the ruler of all fallen angels. Let's move on to the rest of the chapter in verses 13 through 21.

And I'll begin by reading verse 13 of chapter 9. Then 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 who had the trumpet, Release the four angels who were bound at the great river Euphrates. So the four angels, who had been prepared for the hour and day and month and year, were released to kill a third of mankind. Now the number of the army of the horsemen was two hundred million.

I heard the number of them. And thus I saw the horses in the vision. Those who sat on them had breastplates of fiery red, hasteneth blue and sulfur yellow. And the heads of the horses were like the heads of lions. Out of their mouths came fire, smoke and brimstone. By these three plagues, a third of mankind were killed by the fire and the smoke and the brimstone which came out of their mouths. For their power is in their mouth and in their tails, for their tails are like serpents having heads, and with them they do harm. But the rest of mankind who were not killed by these plagues did not repent of the works of their hands, that they should not worship demons and idols of gold, silver, brass, stone and wood, which can neither see nor hear nor walk.

And they did not repent of their murders or sorceries or their sexual immorality or their thefts. First, let's look at verse thirteen. Then the sixth angel sounded and I heard a voice from the four horns of the golden altar, which is before God.

This is the demand. When the sixth angel sounded, this really takes us back to the fifth seal in chapter six, verses nine through ten. This gets back to the martyrs.

Like I said before, we would reference this a number of times. That the martyrs are crying out, how long, oh Lord, how long will you avenge our lives? This is the answer to their prayers in the trumpet judgments.

These are the tools of God's judgment, so let's read verses fourteen and fifteen again. Saying to the sixth angel who had the trumpet, release the four angels who are bound at the great river Euphrates. So the four angels who have been prepared for the hour and day and month and year were released to kill a third of mankind. These four angels that are bound at the great river Euphrates are not the four angels of chapter seven, verse one. These are satanic angels or fallen angels. The release of these angels are similar to the release of the locum of the locust. Good angels restrain evil, as we see in chapter seven, verse one.

But bad angels release evil, as we see in chapter nine here. The river Euphrates is the most frequently mentioned river. It originated in the Garden of Eden in Genesis chapter two, verse fourteen.

It flows south through Mesopotamia, which was later Babylon and Persia. The first sin, the first murder, the Tower of Babel, Babylon itself, all happened at or near the river Euphrates. God's judgment has always been associated with this river. So first, these four angels are the tool of God's judgment. Then let's look at the time of God's judgment in verse fifteen. The four angels have been prepared for the hour and day and month and year were released to kill a third of mankind. The hour and day and month and year. This is evidence that God has a date, but no one knows it.

That is for an appointed time. Like I said before, God's judgment may not be quick, but it is certain. That was the timing of God's judgment.

Let's look at the targets of God's judgment. The four angels' terrors are one third of the remaining habitants of the earth. If you remember, in Revelation chapter six, when we went over that, verse eight tells us that 25% of the world's population was killed. Now a third of the remaining 75% is going to be killed.

By chapter nine, one half of the earth's population is dead at this time. You've been listening to the weekend edition of Truth Matters with Dr. Cheryl Davis. Truth Matters is a ministry of The Truth Project, a North Carolina based ministry dedicated to teaching biblical truth and sound theology to those inside and outside of the church. If you'd like to listen to these messages on demand, go to ProjectTruthMatters.com and click on the podcast link. Dr. Davis is also available to speak to your ministry group or church function. She can be reached by email at CherylDavis at ProjectTruthMatters.com. Or if you'd like to send a letter, the address is Project Truth Matters, Post Office Box 159, St. Paul's, North Carolina 28384. You can hear Truth Matters devotionals on weekdays at 8.20 a.m. and 5.20 p.m. Until next time, let's all work together to teach a biblical truth to assist, equip, edify, and encourage one another and bring the gospel to the world. Because truth matters. This is the Truth Network.