March 20, 2025 | Silver Spring, Maryland, United States | Ted N.C. Wilson, President, General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists
Greetings, friends. In our last video we talked about the incredible joy God’s people will have as they see Jesus coming in the clouds to take them home to heaven. Just before that glorious event, however, the Bible outlines astounding events that will desolate the earth.
In Revelation 18 we read about God’s judgments that will fall on Babylon, that symbolic system of false worship, and all who choose to follow its lead, rather than choosing to be faithful to God.
In verses 5-8 we read: “For her sins have reached to heaven, and God has remembered her iniquities. . . . In the cup which she has mixed, mix double for her. In the measure that she glorified herself and lived luxuriously, in the same measure give her torment and sorrow; for she says in her heart, ‘I sit as queen, and am no widow, and will not see sorrow.’ Therefore her plagues will come in one day—death and mourning and famine. And she will be utterly burned with fire, for strong is the Lord God who judges her” (NKJV).
Those who followed Babylon’s lead will suffer greatly. The seven last plagues outlined in Revelation 16, describe terrible things—loathsome sores, water supplies turning into blood, the sun scorching people with fire, deep darkness, a severe earthquake with lightening and thundering that roars across the earth like the screeching of demons. Then, huge hailstones beat down everything that is left standing.
But amid all these manifestations of divine judgment, the wicked notice that God’s people are kept safe.
We read in The Great Controversy, “The world see the very class whom they have mocked and derided, and desired to exterminate, pass unharmed through pestilence, tempest, and earthquake. He who is to the transgressors of His law a devouring fire, is to His people a safe pavilion” (p. 654).
Truly, God will keep His promises found in Psalm 91: “Because you have made the Lord, who is my refuge, even the Most High, your dwelling place, no evil shall befall you, nor shall any plague come near your dwelling; for He shall give His angels charge over you, to keep you in all your ways” (vss. 1, 4, 9- 11, NKJV).
Ellen White tells us that when the wicked see this, “They realize what they have forfeited by transgression, and they fall at the feet of those whose fidelity they have despised and derided, and confess that God has loved them.” Furthermore, she writes, “The people see that they have been deluded. They accuse one another of having led them to destruction; but all unite in heaping their bitterest condemnation upon the ministers” who have led them astray. “The multitudes are filled with fury. ‘We are lost!’ they cry, ‘and you are the cause of our ruin;’ and they turn upon the false shepherds” (The Great Controversy, pp. 655, 656).
The Bible tells us there will be terrible fighting and bloodshed among the wicked as the turn upon each other.
We read in Zechariah 14:12, 13: “And it shall come to pass in that day, that a great tumult from the Lord shall be among them; and they shall lay hold everyone on the hand of his neighbor, and his hand shall rise up against the hand of his neighbor.”
And in Jeremiah 25:33—“And the slain of the Lord shall be at that day from one end of the earth even unto the other end of the earth: they shall not be lamented, neither gathered, nor buried.”
We are told that “At the coming of Christ the wicked are blotted from the face of the whole earth—consumed with the spirit of His mouth and destroyed by the brightness of His glory. Christ takes His people to the City of God, and the earth is emptied of its inhabitants” (The Great Controversy, p. 657).
Despite all of this, however, it is not quite the end of sin and suffering. There is still more to come, which we will look at in our next video. But until then, let us determine, by God’s grace, to follow Him every day, claiming His promise that “He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty” (Ps. 91:1, NKJV).
Let us pray together.
Father in heaven, thank you for the protection offered to each of us as we look to you completely and follow your instructions and your wonderful laws through the power of the Holy Spirit. We ask now that you will give us guidance as we head into the future and realize that just before the end of time, that great and challenging situation will develop, but that we can rest completely and securely in you and you will protect us. Thank you for hearing us in this prayer. In Jesus name we ask it. Amen.