In this episode, J. Mark examines Revelation 9:13-21, looking at the judgment released by the 6th trumpet. When this trumpet sounded, lion-headed horses who breathed fire were released upon the earth, carrying out God’s divine judgment. Instead of repenting and turning from their sin, humanity continued in their sin, showing that transformation comes only through the grace of God. Join us as we explore the surreal nature of these horses in three different stages.
In the Bible, the power of horses is depicted as an unstoppable, overwhelming force in warfare and judgment. God describes the horse’s eagerness for battle in graphic detail during His questioning of Job in chapter 39, verses 19-25.
19 “Have you given the horse strength?
Have you clothed his neck with thunder?
20 Can you frighten him like a locust?
His majestic snorting strikes terror.
21 He paws in the valley, and rejoices in his strength;
He gallops into the clash of arms.
22 He mocks at fear, and is not frightened;
Nor does he turn back from the sword.
23 The quiver rattles against him,
The glittering spear and javelin.
24 He devours the distance with fierceness and rage;
Nor does he come to a halt because the trumpet has sounded.
25 At the blast of the trumpet, he says, ‘Aha!’
He smells the battle from afar,
The thunder of captains and shouting.
Consider how it must have felt as a foot soldier to face the terrifying sight and sound of a cavalry charge! The thunder of the hooves, the size of the animals bearing down on you, and the sheer disadvantage of position would strike fear into the heart of the bravest infantryman. Jeremiah 8:16 gives a vivid picture of this.
In Deuteronomy chapter 17, God, through Moses, gave instructions about how future kings of Israel should conduct themselves. One of the prohibitions was, “He shall not multiply horses for himself, nor cause the people to return to Egypt to multiply horses, for the Lord has said to you, ‘You shall not return that way again.’”
The primary reason for the prohibition is clear; they were not to return to Egypt for any reason. Additionally, they were not to rely on military might or their horses’ strength for victory; they were to trust the Lord. Finally, God knew that having horses would tempt a king to become proud and tyrannical. King Solomon disobeyed God’s command and became all of the above.
In our journey through the book of Revelation, we’ve come to the sounding of the sixth trumpet. In this scene from John’s vision, he describes an army of 200 million horsemen! But these do not seem to be ordinary cavalry. Let’s begin our study titled “Surreal Horses” from Revelation 9:13-21.
13 Then the sixth angel sounded: And I heard a voice from the four horns of the golden altar which is before God,
14 saying to the sixth angel who had the trumpet, “Release the four angels who are bound at the great river Euphrates.”
15 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.
16 Now the number of the army of the horsemen was two hundred million; I heard the number of them.
17 And thus I saw the horses in the vision: those who sat on them had breastplates of fiery red, hyacinth blue, and sulfur yellow; and the heads of the horses were like the heads of lions; and out of their mouths came fire, smoke, and brimstone.
18 By these three plagues a third of mankind was killed—by the fire and the smoke and the brimstone which came out of their mouths.
19 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.
20 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.
21 And they did not repent of their murders or their sorceries or their sexual immorality or their thefts.
The surreal nature of these horses is revealed in several STAGES, showing the increasing severity of judgment on the wicked.
The First Stage is
The Release of the Demons
At the sounding of the 6th trumpet, John hears a voice coming from the four horns of the golden altar, the altar of incense, before the throne of God.” In Revelation 8:3, this altar is the scene of the offering of incense, which are the prayers of saints. This is its final mention in the book of Revelation. It is implied that this judgment, like those preceding it, is partially an answer to the prayers of the persecuted saints for their deliverance.
The voice addresses the angel with the 6th trumpet and gives the command, “Loose the four angels which are bound at the great river Euphrates.” The Euphrates River is universally recognized, along with the Tigris, as one of the most historically and spiritually significant river systems on Earth. It is deeply intertwined with the histories of major world religions. It rises in Armenia and joins the Tigris in lower Babylonia, for a total length of nearly 1800 miles. In John’s day, it ran along the eastern boundary of the Roman Empire next to Parthia.
To the prophets of Israel, the Euphrates was the symbol of all that was disastrous in the divine judgments. Revelation 16:12-14 gives us further insight. “Then the sixth angel poured out his bowl on the great river Euphrates, and its water was dried up, so that the way of the kings from the east might be prepared. And I saw three unclean spirits like frogs coming out of the mouth of the dragon, out of the mouth of the beast, and out of the mouth of the false prophet. For they are spirits of demons, performing signs, which go out to the kings of the earth and of the whole world, to gather them to the battle of that great day of God Almighty.” It seems like this area of the Euphrates will be the headquarters of the counterfeit trinity.
These angels, in verse 14, are bound. That indicates that they are fallen, evil angels. Nowhere in Scripture are good angels ever described as bound. Even though these angels serve Satan’s purposes, he cannot release them until the time appointed by God. This scene reminds us of the limitations on Satan’s power.
Notice that these angels “had been prepared for the hour and day and month and year.” The angels are prepared for the specific hour appointed by God, and that this hour shall fall on its appointed day, month, and year. They were ready and waiting for the command.
The release of these demonic spirits leads us to the next stage of the judgment.
The Next Stage is,
The Return of Death
With the sounding of the 6th trumpet, the 4 fallen angels bound at the Euphrates are loosed. They are the leaders of the second demonic invasion. One angel led the previous invasion (9:1); this one is led by four.
The four angels were released to kill one-third of the Earth’s population. In the previous trumpet judgment, tormented men wanted to die and couldn’t. Now, one-third of the population will die. The judgment of the fourth seal (Revelation 6:8) killed one quarter of the earth’s population; this additional third brings the death toll from these two judgments alone to at least half the earth’s population. The repeated emphasis throughout the trumpet judgments on one-third assures us that these are controlled, precise divine judgments, not natural disasters.
Next, John describes a huge army of horsemen. This army numbered 200 million! In the first century, people would have thought of the Parthians, the world’s most dreaded cavalry. They came from this region of Mesopotamia and filled men with fear and dread. The Parthians were the only warriors whom the Romans could not, and did not, defeat after repeated attempts. In Revelation 16, the kings of the East come from this same region. Historically, this is the direction from which Israel and Judah’s enemies came.
As if anticipating that some skeptical readers would doubt that huge number, John emphatically insisted on the precision of the number, testifying, “I heard the number of them.”
There has been considerable debate about these horsemen. I usually take the prophetic Scriptures as literally as possible, so I will not eliminate the possibility of a huge human army. Still, I am doubtful that these are an army of literal horsemen. Rather, it is a demonic force that is completely overwhelming, unmatched, and unstoppable. The number of the horsemen here is comparable to the innumerable chariots of God mentioned in Psalm 68:17. The description of the horses and their leaders, namely the four fallen angels, argues for a demonic army.
John specifically states that he saw the horses and their riders in his vision, and what grotesque specimens they were! Take note of the words “as of” and “like” as John struggles to describe what he’s seeing in terms that his readers, including us, can understand.
The riders have breastplates (as of) fire (red), jacinth or hyacinth (sapphire-blue), and brimstone (sulfurous yellow). These are the very colors and features of hell (Rev. 14:10; 19:20; 20:10; 21:8), and they paint a terrifying picture of God’s wrath poured out on the sinful world by these demons. These colors are also reminiscent of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah (Gen. 19:24–28).
Please note that it is the horses, not their riders, who bring death during this time. “The heads of the horses were like the heads of lions; and out of their mouths came fire, smoke, and brimstone. By these three plagues, a third of mankind was 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.”
Natural horses do not breathe “fire and smoke and brimstone” (the same colors as their breastplates) from “their mouths.” Neither do they have tails like serpents with multiple heads. This verse suggests that these horses and riders are probably not human cavalry but rather an evil, demonic army. This is an awesome picture of an almost irresistible military force destroying everything in its path.
John noted three ways that the demon horses killed their victims, all of which picture the violent, devastating fury of hell. Each of these plagues is preceded in the text by the definite article, meaning each one is a distinct feature. They incinerated them with fire. They asphyxiated them with smoke. Brimstone is an old name for sulfur; when it burns, it melts into a dark liquid and produces a bright, low-temperature blue flame. Imagine the excruciating pain of people dying slowly after coming into contact with this molten liquid.
The horse was anointed with war force, the lion with vicious, deadly power, the serpent with deadly venom. These images describe the supernatural deadliness of this demon force in terms that are commonly understood in the natural realm. Unlike the scorpion stings of the previous demonic assault (9:5), the snakebites inflicted by this host will be fatal.[1]
Some commentators see in John’s descriptions a picture of modern warfare rather than of ancient weapons. Some have suggested that they represent modern weapons that fire both forward (“their mouths”) and backward (“their tails”), such as missiles or artillery. This is a possibility, though John would have had no concept of such things.
If modern warfare is envisioned here, it may indicate that, though there may be disarmament in the early phases of the period between the rapture and the second coming, by the close of the tribulation, modern means of war are once again fully employed. The world that longs for peace and seeks to attain it by the worship of the beast of Revelation 13 will learn the sad lesson that there can be no peace until the Prince of Peace rules.
Regardless of what the actual composition of this army is, its activities lead us to the final stage of the 6th trumpet judgment.
The Final Stage is,
The Reaction of Defiance
The two closing verses of the chapter reveal an astounding picture of human depravity. Two-thirds of the earth’s population, spared from death, refuse to change their creed or their conduct. Did God harden their hearts like He did Pharaoh’s heart in the Exodus from Egypt?
It is almost unimaginable that after years of suffering and death under the terrifying judgments from God, coupled with the powerful preaching of the gospel by the 144,000 Jewish evangelists, the two witnesses, and other believers, the survivors will still refuse to repent. Such is the hardness of the human heart, even when faced with worldwide destruction and divine judgment from God. This is a clear testimony to God’s power to deal summarily with every soul.[2]
As he concludes his account of this amazing vision, John lists five sins representative of the defiance of those who refused to repent. First, they “did not repent of the works of their hands, so as not to worship demons, and the idols of gold and of silver and of brass and of stone and of wood, which can neither see nor hear nor walk.”
To worship any idol or false deity is, in fact, to worship demons. The Septuagint (the Greek translation of the Old Testament) renders Psalm 96:5 as “All the gods of the peoples are demons.” The apostle Paul declared that “the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to demons” (1 Cor. 10:20).
When people worship idols, gods that do not exist, demons who do exist will impersonate those gods and hold idolaters captive to their demonic power. False religions are not void of the supernatural; they are full of it, because they offer demons the best opportunities to capture souls. They are the demonic fortresses of blindness spoken of in 2 Corinthians 10:4–5, which must be torn down with the truth if souls are to be delivered.
Further, those under God’s judgment also refused to repent of their murders, witchcraft, sexual immorality, and thievery. This wickedness is not surprising because those who worship demons have given their allegiance to Satan. Jesus said of him, “He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him,” (John 8:44). Later, in John 10:10, He added, “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy.”
The word “sorceries” in our text comes from the Greek pharmakon. From this, we get the English words “pharmacy” and “pharmaceuticals.” Drugs were and still are believed to induce a higher religious state of communion with false gods. Pharmakōn can also refer to poisons, amulets, charms, séances, witchcraft, incantations, magic spells, contacting mediums, or any object tied to pagan idolatry used to elicit lust. As spiritual darkness deepens and the world grows more violent, people will dive deeper into the satanic trappings of false religion.
Spiritually speaking, there are four distinct categories of drug misuse: (1) taking drugs to explore spiritual realms, (2) taking drugs to engage in “sorcery, witchcraft, and magic arts,” (3) giving drugs to other people to gain control over them, and (4) taking drugs for pleasure. While they provide temporary enjoyment, they often have adverse medical and psychological effects. Even worse, they open a person to supernatural spiritual experiences, but these experiences are almost always demonic and not from God.
In our world today, sexual immorality and theft have reached shocking proportions. I can only imagine how evil will multiply when the Restrainer (2 Thessalonians 2:7) is taken out of the way! It is sobering to realize that the Lord will one day come “to execute judgment upon all, and to convict all the ungodly of all their ungodly deeds which they have done in an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things which ungodly sinners have spoken against Him” (Jude 15). In light of that coming judgment it is the responsibility of all believers to faithfully proclaim the gospel to unbelievers, thereby “snatching them out of the fire”(Jude 23).
Though the power of satanic false religion is evident in the world, it lacks the transforming, purifying, redeeming quality found only in the power and grace of God. Men can be made to fear God by the demonstration of divine power, but they are not brought to repentance apart from faith in Christ and divine grace. Have you accepted that divine grace that rescues from sin and allows escape from divine justice? I pray that you have. If you haven’t, now is the time!
[1] MacArthur, New Testament Commentary on Revelation, p. 384
[2] Walvoord, The Revelation of Jesus Christ, p. 166
