(AN: Welcome back to this story. I finally decided to just buckle down and finish writing this story, and so it has been finished. It took a while because, well, I was afraid to do this latter half. After all, the source material quite literally admonishes against adding or taking away from what has been written. That and several personal demons regarding what is foretold, but that's just me.)
(Hope you enjoy what there is to offer.)
The Last Warning
What John saw next was shocking. He saw the hosts of Heaven, even as Ezekiel had seen them, and the LORD Jesus, depicted as a seven-horned lamb with its neck broken as if it had been slain for the sacrifice. He saw the righteous, the one hundred and forty-four thousand, praising the Lamb for all time.
Then he saw the Lamb open the seven seals upon the world, and seven angels blowing upon their seven trumpets. He saw armies of long-haired men, seeming like the sons of the desert, yet they breathed fire out of their mouths, destroying all in their way. He saw two witnesses, one old and one young, preach the coming until they were killed in the streets of Babylon. He saw the Heavens opened and, to his surprise, he saw something hidden there that had been lost from the Earth for centuries: something many believed had been destroyed, broken down and lost forever.
The Ark of the Covenant.
Still in his mind as his eyes were drawn back to the Lamb was the Woman, shining brighter than the sun, and her child, born to rule. The Dragon did not win, but its successor, the seven-headed Beast, had survived. The second Beast, rising up peacefully out of the earth, rather than out of the tumultuous ocean, worried him the most. It blasphemed the name of God, claiming that God was his alone and none others. Then he made all men worship the first Beast and follow him, by which they were marked with an invisible tau, just as the Righteous were in Ezekiel's book: a tau of three consecutive sixes.
Suddenly, as soon as the song ended - one whose words he could not understand, not yet, at least - his attention was turned back to the Earth. An angel flew over the Earth and spoke at once to the whole Earth: even as it had happened at the Shavuot, all the world heard his words in their own language.
"Fear God and give glory to Him," the first angel admonished. "Worship Him who made the heavens, the earth, the sea and the fountains of water. The Hour of Judgment has come!"
Suddenly, he saw something in the distance, though he could not see what it was. At last there appeared another angel, who spoke as the first had done...
"Babylon the Great is fallen!" he cried out. "Fallen is that great city which made the nations of the earth drink the wine of her wrathful fornication!"
Just as soon as this angel had appeared, a third and final one approached and said this final warning:
"If any one worships the Beast," the angel warned. "Thereby receiving the tau, by works or by thought, they shall drink of the wrath of God. They shall have no rest, either night or day, until they are consumed in the presence of God and His angels with fire and brimstone!"
"John," the voice of Jesus spoke.
"Y-Yes, my LORD?" John asked, his own voice small, feeble and weak in comparison.
"Write this: Here is the patience of the holy ones. Here are they which keep My commands and have the Testimony of the Christ. From this day onward, blessed are those which die in the LORD."
"Verily," said the Ruach, the Spirit of Holiness, that had guided him all through these many years. "For they shall at last have rest from their weary labors, and their works shall follow them. But come, look up!"
Looking as directed, John saw the King sitting upon a cloud, with the sickle of a harvester in His hand. Suddenly two angels appeared at His side from the Holy Temple.
"LORD," the first said, covering his face with his many wings. "Gather the wheat: the time to harvest has come and the harvest is ready."
With one wave of the sickle, thousands, and ten thousands more, were swept up into the cloud. Then the second angel spoke, with a grave and sad countenance upon his face.
"LORD," he began, as the first had, covering his face. "Gather the grapes from off the earth, for their time has come."
With another wave of the sickle, billions were taken without the realm of the City and crushed in the wine-press: miles of blood spilled out from where they had been utterly destroyed in the final, merciful destruction.
"My LORD," John asked. "What does this mean? Why have they been destroyed so?"
"Come," Sherael, who sat at John's side and led him, spoke. "Behold this!" With one hand, the angel lifted John away and brought him before a sea of glass, clear as crystal, that glowed as though with a cool, blue-white fire. All around were the holy ones, victorious over the Beast and its mark. They sang the song of Moses, that which had been sung when Israel was victorious over Pharaoh. Then sang they the triumph of the Lamb, even as John had heard it before.
Worthy is the Lamb that was slain
And hath redeemed us to God by His blood
To receive power, and riches, and wisdom
And strength, and honor, and glory, and blessing
Blessing and honor, glory and power, be unto Him
That sitteth upon the Throne, and unto the Lamb
Forever and ever, for ever and ever. Amen
Then sang they a new verse, and strummed upon golden harps, given to them by the King Himself:
Great and marvelous are Thy works LORD God Almighty
Just and true are Thy ways Thou King of the Saints
Who shall not fear Thee, O LORD And glorify Thy Name?
For all nations shall come and worship before Thee
For Thy judgments are made manifest
"But what does this mean?" John asked.
"Look back to the Temple!" Sherael instructed.
Turning as instructed, John saw the Temple filled with smoke, and seven angels backing away from some great and terrible wrath. In white were they, and gold were their sashes. They came before the six Cherubim, six wings filled with eyes and four faces upon their heads - lion, man, eagle and ox - who gave them seven golden vials filled with something that made them weep.
"What is it?" John asked.
"Behold," Sherael said. "The warning has been given by the angels three. Now the wrath of God shall be poured out upon the obstinately wicked in these Seven Last Plagues."
John watched as, one by one, the angels poured the contents of their vials upon those who, though they had been given the warning a thousand times over, chose rather to hazard their souls than accept love. The first one poured out its vial, and the wicked were stricken with boils, even more hideous than those which had afflicted Egypt of old.
The second one poured out its vial, and the sea turned to blood, even as the waters of Egypt had turned to blood, and all the fish died. The third angel poured out its vial, and all the water that was not within the sea was turned to blood.
"It is just, O Holy One!" spoke the angel whose governance are the waters of the Earth. "They killed Your holy people and Your prophets, let them now drink the blood they have shed."
The fourth angel poured out his vial, and what John saw was amazing. The sun burned brighter and hotter than before, and it burned those who remained. Rather than admit their error, even as Pharaoh had done under this many plagues, they raised hateful fists and curses up to Heaven. The God they neither believed in nor feared they now blamed for the fury of the sun. The fifth angel then poured out his vial, and darkness fell upon the 'eternal city', dark even as the darkness of Egypt. Like beasts, mankind ate on their own drying tongues for lack of water, yet they did not change. Rather than admit their error, they raised hateful cries and curses to the darkened sky: the God they neither believed in nor feared they now blamed for the darkness.
Then came the sixth angel, who poured out his vial and dried up the Euphrates. Then there appeared three demons in the shape of frogs, and what John saw next filled his heart with dread. They appeared before the nations of the world, from east to west, north and south, in the image of Jesus Christ. Then came flashing into John's mind what Jesus had said that afternoon on the slopes of the Mount of Olives.
For in those times will come great tribulation: such as was never seen, has never been seen, or never again will be seen. Unless, for the sake of the saved, those days are shortened, nothing will survive. In those days, if a man says 'The Messiah is here' or 'He is there', do not believe them! False Messiahs and false prophets will arise in those days. These will show great signs and wonders, and make, if it was possible, the very elect to be lost.
This was it, then: the Great Time of Trouble. He had warned them before to watch, and now John knew what they were to watch for: to know the truth, so that they might not be deceived.
Looking back, he saw the demonic Christ-counterfeits convincing the world of some great evil. All pretense of worshiping God or calling out to Him were gone. The demons said that they actually had a chance of destroying the Kingdom of God, of conquering Heaven and eating of the Tree of Life, thereby creating an everlasting kingdom of darkness and suffering. The peoples of Earth believed them and, with the Euphrates and the seas dried up, they all gathered together at Har-Megiddo, where they hoped to begin their assault on God's throne.
"IT IS FINISHED!" an angry voice cried out from the smoking Temple. In such contrast was it to the dying Savior on the Cross as John remembered Him. Now he knew how this had to be done. Salvation, redemption, had been given to all the world, but they refused, falling in love rather with sin and death than with God. Now they were to be punished accordingly.
With that, John saw that Sherael held in her hand the last vial, which was at last poured down upon the earth. For the space of about an hour, there was silence. Then it happened.
Just as it had happened when He died on the side of the hill, it happened this time: only worse. It was like the worst portents of doom from the pages of Isaiah had come to life, yet even his words could not do them justice. Lightning cracked across the sky, thunder roared, and an earthquake struck all of the earth at once. So great was the earthquake that John feared for his life. It was the greatest earthquake ever, the like of which has never been felt upon the earth. Rome was struck in three pieces, all the cities of the earth crumbled, islands melted, great mountains crumbled to dust.
Then a great hail fell upon the earth, greater than that which had struck down Egypt. That had only been fiery hail: this hail was so great, men were killed instantly when struck by the hundred-pound shards of ice. As before, they cried out because of the hail, not because they were sorrowful for their open rebellion.
In fear of the terrifying earthquake, the thunder, the melting earth and the great hail, John closed his eyes in fear.
(AN: Lots to swallow here. Well, I saw there was a movie about the Revelation featuring Richard Harris and John. However, this version of the Apocalypse will be different, in comparison to the one depicted in the film. Note the re-wording of the Third Angel's message. That is only for clarity sake: if the Mark [or tau] of the Beast is compulsory, why does 'worship the Beast' precede 'receive the Mark'? Worship implies acting, rather than being forced to do something. Also, the Third Angel's message says that those who receive the Mark have no rest day or night, that clause being separate from the statement of eternal smoke previously in the sentence. That is for real from the OKJV.)
(Guest character from Joshua makes appearance here. I refer to Sherael as "she" just out of artistic license, since there are no genders among angels. Originally just a Guardian assigned to Christ during His stay, she also appears as one of the three Angels in a flash-back of Exodus [though, if I do make a story about Abraham, she might get the cut, and it would be Michael, Gabriel and Metatron, since he'll have a bigger role in Abraham, serving as God's pre-Incarnation mouth-piece], and has now been upgraded to one of the Angels of the Seven Last Plagues. Originally wanted to make her a Guardian for mortals in my own novelization of the end [my response to Left Behind], but I'm not exactly sure about that now.)
(Who else had the last movement of Handel's Messiah symphony at the part of the Song of Moses and the Lamb?)