28 Jan 2014
Revelation 16:10-11
Revelation 16:10: “And the fifth angel poured out his vial upon the seat of the beast; and his kingdom was full of darkness; and they gnawed their tongues for pain,
11 And blasphemed the God of heaven because of their pains and their sores, and repented not of their deeds.”
This judgment is a bit harder to understand than the others. It appears that God strikes the lands of the antichrist with darkness, just as He did back in ancient Egypt. However, there is more to it than this, as people “gnawed their tongues for pain”. This darkness appears to involve pains and sores (v11) – as if the people were also struck by some sort of plague. The pain appears to be horrifying.
Once again we see that this judgment is aimed at those who are lost, since verse 11 says that they “repented not of their deeds”. This is ancient Egypt all over again: God sent plagues against the land, but the Egyptians would not let His people go. God struck the Egyptians with plagues and spared the Israelites, but the Egyptians would still not let His people go. Here God sends horrible, painful judgments upon the wicked, and still they will not repent. All they do is curse God that much more.