Word of Encouragement (12/21/2021)
After this I heard what seemed to be the loud voice of a great multitude in heaven, crying out, “Hallelujah! Salvation and glory and power belong to our God, 2 for his judgments are true and just; for he has judged the great prostitute who corrupted the earth with her immorality, and has avenged on her the blood of his servants” (Rev. 19:1-2).
“Hallelujah” means “Praise the Lord!” A great multitude in heaven is praising God. They are doing so by ascribing “salvation and glory and power” to God. What is the occasion? God “has judged the great prostitute who corrupted the earth with her immorality, and has avenged on her the blood of his servants.” “The great prostitute” is Babylon. According to this praise, she was guilty of two things: 1) As an agent of Satan, she corrupted the earth with her immorality; 2) she also shed the blood of God’s servants. The account of her fall/judgment is given in ch. 18. We can say that Babylon is “the spirit of the age” or “the spirit of anti-Christ” or any institution operated by that spirit.
Babylon may use all kinds of subtle methods, but her strategy is quite simple: seduce people away from God to follow her way and corrupt them; if they don’t fall for her temptation, shed their blood. We see a type of Babylon in Jezebel, the infamous pagan wife of Ahab. Elisha told Jehu, “And you shall strike the house of Ahab your master, that I may avenge the blood of My servants the prophets, and the blood of all the servants of the LORD, at the hand of Jezebel” (2 Kings 9:7). In these words, there is a reference to her wicked act of killing God’s servants the prophets, who most likely called her out on her pagan beliefs and practices. But we also know that she corrupted Israel by bringing in the prophets of Baal and Asherah and promoting the pagan religion of Baal. By the time Elijah and these pagan prophets had a contest at Mount Carmel, there were in Israel 450 prophets of Baal and 400 prophets of Asherah (1 Kings 18:19)!
It is clear that there cannot be any peaceful coexistence with Babylon, the great prostitute. To be sure, we will “coexist” with Babylon until God’s final judgment. The question is what kind of coexistence it is. Certainly, not a peaceful one! We may want to live and let live. But Babylon has no such intention. Either she will make us bow down to her in surrender or seek to destroy us: there is nothing in between. Nothing is more foolish and dangerous for us to live in peace with the great prostitute. Yet, how many of us are so eager to flirt with Babylon! Talk about playing with fire!
This is not to say that we should shun the world and our unbelieving neighbors. Christ has sent us into the world as His witnesses to them. God commanded us to love our neighbors, even our enemies (Matt. 5:44). But we must be mindful of the spirit of Babylon, which is at work to turn everything good into something evil—appetite into gluttony, need for money into love of money, love for others into idolatry, need for rest into idleness, for example. Babylon can use our friendship with our neighbors to silence our witness to Christ. We must persevere in speaking the truth in love and adorning the gospel with our work of faith (Tit. 2:10; 1 Thess. 1:3).
Let us keep our hearts and minds alert so that we do not conform to the world but be transformed by the renewal our minds according to God’s Word.