Revelation 09: Jesus is Our Justice

Ever wondered what locusts with human faces, lion's teeth, and scorpion stings have to do with your spiritual journey? Revelation 9 contains some of the Bible's most bizarre and unsettling imagery, yet beneath these apocalyptic visions lies a profound message that speaks directly to our hearts today.

Pastor Brandon skillfully navigates this challenging chapter, revealing how its strange symbolism would have resonated with first-century Christians facing persecution under Roman rule. Rather than getting lost in end-times speculation, we explore how the imagery of devastating locusts and massive armies represented the political and military threats that John's original audience understood all too well. The locusts torment those without God's seal, while a 200-million-strong army brings destruction that kills a third of humanity.

But the most troubling revelation isn't the calamity itself—it's humanity's response. Despite witnessing these terrifying judgments, people "still refused to repent of their evil deeds and turn to God." This stubborn refusal reveals a timeless truth about human nature: our tendency to double down on our own ways rather than turning to God when times get tough. As Pastor Brandon poignantly observes, "Everybody is either heading into a battle, in the middle of a battle, or just now coming out of one." The question isn't whether we'll face difficulties—we will—but where we'll turn when they arrive.

The chapter ultimately challenges us to establish our relationship with God before crisis strikes. "Don't wait to be in the battle before you know who your King is," Pastor Brandon advises, "because in the battle is the worst time to decide where your loyalty is." When we understand this, Revelation becomes less about predicting future horrors and more about preparing our hearts today. Join us as we discover how "Jesus is our justice" even in the midst of life's darkest moments.

What battles are you currently facing, and where are you turning for strength? Listen now and share your thoughts on the Bible Breakdown discussion group on Facebook.

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The More We Dig. The More We Find.

Chapters

• 0:00 Jesus is our Justice
• 3:40 Understanding Revelation's Purpose
• 7:36 The Locusts from the Smoke
• 10:19 The Army of 200 Million
• 12:44 Refusing to Repent
• 14:00 Prepare Your Heart Before Battle

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:24

Well, everybody, welcome back to the Bible Breakdown Podcast with your host, pastor Brandon, today, revelation, chapter 9, and today's title is Jesus is our justice. Jesus is our justice. And I just got to tell you this is one of those chapters that is just I don't know. It's just creepy. Okay, there's just some stuff going on in Revelation, chapter 9. So we're going to read it, we're going to get creeped out together and then be so thankful that we are sitting right here right now. We're going to get all that in just a moment. But, as always, if you like what we're doing here and you haven't done it yet, please make sure you like, share and subscribe to the YouTube channel and the podcast. Make sure you're leaving us a five-star review on the podcast it doesn't cost you anything, but it really helps us get the word out and make sure you're going to the Bible Breakdown discussion on Facebook. They're doing an amazing job over there and, as always, the more we dig, the more we find. Well, once again and I feel like it's important that we constantly say this especially we get into interesting chapters like today. That is, that we have to remember that the book of Revelation is primarily a book about Jesus and it's about the fact that Jesus wins. Jesus is victorious over all these things. And so the goal of the book of Revelation if you remember, way back at the beginning, john said it's a revelation about Jesus Christ and the things that must take place hereafter. And so he is writing primarily to these seven churches that are in Asia, and he is writing to them as they are experiencing horrible persecution from Rome, from non-Christians, from Jerusalem, from just invading armies and different things. And especially during the time that we're talking about this, there was this emperor named Domitian and he's the guy who's putting people to death in the Colosseums and stuff like that. Because they are saying that Jesus is God, and especially during this time as well, there was a heightened reality that they were worshiping the emperor as God. And when they're saying no, no, jesus is God. They had a problem with that, and that's why Revelation chapter one opens up with saying no, you're right, jesus is God. He describes Jesus as God.

Speaker 1: 2:34

Chapter 2 and 3 is him saying I see you, seven churches. This is what's good, this is what's not good. Here's your next steps 4, 5, 6, and 7,. He's talking about the opening of the seals, which is a way for is a symbology of God taking back over the world. And now in 7, or, excuse me, 8 and 9, there are these trumpets that are happening, and it's once again symbology. We've got to realize and remember this is not literally an angel sitting there going ta-do, you know. It is a symbol of what's happening.

Speaker 1: 3:05

68% of the book of Revelation comes from the Old Testament, and so you're going to see a lot of this different imagery that John is not, you know, of course, inspired of the Holy Spirit. He's not making up off top of his head. These are things that have come up in the book of Exodus, the book of Joel, the book of Numbers, you know, and all these different things, and so these are crazy, but these would not have been completely foreign to the early church. And also to remember that the goal of this podcast is not to use the book of Revelation to predict the future. There's a lot of great podcasts, a lot of people who have really just taken their whole life to look at what the book of Revelation could mean in the future. I want to look at what it meant to the original audience, because it cannot mean to us what it did not mean to them, and since it was primarily written to them and this was meant to be a book of encouragement, that's what we want to do. And so we're going to look at this and just kind of kind of just be creeped out together and then we're going to look and see what parallel this could have meant to the original audience and see what encouragement would come from this. Okay, you ready, here we go.

Speaker 1: 4:21

Revelation, chapter 9, verse 1 says this Smoke, excuse me, when he opened it, smoke poured out as though from a huge furnace, and the sunlight and the air turned dark from the smoke. Then locusts came from the smoke and descended on the earth and they were given power to sting like scorpions. They were told not to harm the grass or the plants or the trees, but only the people who did not have the seal of God on their foreheads. They were told not to kill them but to torture them for five months with pain like the pain of a scorpion sting. Okay, I don't know if you've ever been bit by a scorpion me neither. I couldn't even get past how they look, but that sounds horrible. Okay, verse six in those days, people will seek death but will not find it. They will long to die, but death will flee from them.

Speaker 1: 5:12

The locusts look like a horse, prepared for battle. They had what looked like gold crowns on their heads and their faces looked like human faces. They had hair like a woman's hair and teeth like teeth of a lion. They wore armor made of iron and their wings roared like an army of chariots rushing into battle. They had tails that stung like scorpions and for five months they had the power to torment people. Their king is the angel of the bottomless pit. His name in Hebrew is Abaddon and Greek is Apollyon the destroyer.

Speaker 1: 5:51

The first terror has passed, but look, two more terrors are coming Now. Pause, now, this is where okay, let's just time out for a moment. This is where, if you've ever heard people talk about how there are helicopters in the New Testament, in the book of Revelation, and you're like what You're crazy? Well, that's where this comes from. It's because if you look at this and you look sideways and you squint real hard, you could see how someone could take this and I'm not making fun of people who do, I'm just saying as they're really trying to picture something that hasn't happened yet. That would be what they would do, but for the people, the early church, they would have not known what a helicopter was, but during the time, locusts were a very, very common example to use as an invading army. Because locusts would come through and just devastate an area. People were afraid of swarming locusts.

Speaker 1: 6:43

And the book of joel you look at how it used locusts to talk about invading armies that was coming in, and one of the things that rome absolutely was terrified of is they were terrified of invading armies coming in from the east, and so what the original people reading this would have thought of is this would have thought been this would have looked like, or sounded like, absolutely invincible foreign warriors who are coming in and were absolutely devastating the place. Only, instead of killing people, they would be torturing them and imprisoning them, which is still not not fun. Okay, not fun, okay, not fun. All right, here we go, verse 13. Then the sixth angel blew his trumpet and I heard a voice speaking from the four horns of the gold altar that stands in the presence of God. The voice of the sixth angel who held the trumpet said Release the four angels who are bound in the great river Euphrates. Then four angels who had been prepared for this hour, day and month and year were turned loose to kill one third of the people on earth. I heard the size of their army and it was 200 million mounted troops. That would have just been a number almost unfathomable to the people.

Speaker 1: 7:53

Reading in the early church, verse 17,. In my vision I saw the horses and the riders sitting on them. The riders wore armor that was fiery red and dark, blue and yellow, and the horses had heads like lions. Fire and smoke and burning sulfur billowed from their mouths. One-third of all the people of the earth were killed by these three plagues, by the fire and the smoke and the burning sulfur that came from the mouth of the horses. Their power was in their mouths and in their tails, for their tails had heads like snakes and power to injure people. But the people who did not die in these plagues still refused to repent of their evil deeds and turn to God and continue to worship demons and idols made of gold, silver, bronze, stone and wood, idols that can neither see nor hear nor walk. They did not repent of their murders and for their witchcraft and for their sexual immorality or their thefts.

Speaker 1: 8:54

Wow, there's a couple of things going on here, obviously. Number one is there is a bunch of symbolism? I don't think. Okay, here's one thing I will say. I don't think that the Bible is literally describing these things as literal things. This is symbology. Now, I don't know. I don't think any of us know. We talked about this before. I think that prophecy is one of those things that it works out that it's only after the fact and we look back and we go, oh well, yeah, that looked exactly like a horse with like like the tail of a lion and all this kind of stuff. This is exactly what that looked like, but it's in the time, we don't know.

Speaker 1: 9:28

And so what would this have looked like to the early church? What this would have looked like is absolute chaos, where battles and armies are fighting against one another Technology they didn't understand at the time. Battles are raging back and forth. All this kind of just chaos is going on, and the main point that would have been noted is, first of all, on the front end, to realize that these things are happening not outside of the power of God. These things are happening not outside of the power of God. And then, on the backside, the most disheartening, tragic thing was when these things are happening, people are not turning to God, but they're doubling down on their idolatry, they're doubling down on all the things that they think will work and they're doubling down on all their sin. That would have been the devastating thing to the early church, because they're seeing what looks like the chaos of war, the chaos of conquering, but yet they're not turning to the Lord. And so the early church would have been saying why don't you turn to God? Why not turn back to God? That's where the peace is, that's where it is, and that would be showing them that that's just the way of the world. And what does that say to us today? And that is this, that that's just the way of the world. And what does that say to us today? And that is this that it may grieve us to see, but many times we don't truly know what's in the heart of somebody until bad things happen. Do you know?

Speaker 1: 10:47

It's easy to worship God when everything's going well. Think about it. When things are going really well, well, yeah, praise the Lord, too blessed, to be stressed. The Lord is good. Well, what do you do when things start going bad? God? Where are you, god? Why aren't you here? I guess I got to take this on myself. I guess I got to do all of this by myself. You start trying to live for your own desires and live your own ways rather than trusting in God, and it's when bad things start happening that people's true colors start to come out. Things start happening that people's true color start to come out, and what we have to be really careful of is we have to be really careful to make sure that, before the bad times happen, we make sure our relationship with God is solid.

Speaker 1: 11:27

Because here's the thing I want to tell you and it's absolutely true, and I wish it wasn't true, but it is Everybody you and I know is in one of three places in their life they're either heading into a battle, they're in the middle of a battle, or they're just now coming out of one. Well, pastor, I wish you'd be more positive. Okay, I am positive. Everybody you know is either coming out of a battle, they're in a battle, or they're going into one. It's just a way of life, and so the reality is is don't wait to be in the battle before you know who your king is, before you know who you're serving, because in the battle is the worst time to decide where your loyalty is. Instead, before it happens, say Jesus, you are my king. When the battle hit the people in chapter 9, they turned away from God. Make sure we're always turning toward him because when we do, his seal is on our head and he protects us from the worst of it.

Speaker 1: 12:20

Let's pray right now, god, thank you so much for today. Thank you, god, that you see us and that you know us and that you're with us. And, lord, there's chapters like this that are dark and difficult. We realize, god, that even in the difficult and the dark, your goal is to always turn the hearts of your people back toward you. All throughout the Old Testament, god, when you would send judgment, it was always to turn the hearts of the people back toward you, and many times it worked. Many times, in our stubbornness it doesn't. I pray for all of us who are listening and watching this. Let it never be said of us that we turned our heart away from you, but that we're always turning our heart more toward you, every day. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. In the name of God's word, says Revelation 1, verse 7,. Look, he comes with the clouds of heaven and everyone will see him. Let the day when Jesus returns be something that we look forward to, not something we dread. I love you. I'll see you tomorrow for Revelation, chapter 10.