O Pharmakon-Lent 11, 2022

Let’s take a quick moment to point out that Revelation (that we’re studying for Lent) is not a strict chronology. We can’t follow it like numbered connect-the-dots to form the picture. We’re passing through an interlude describing the spiritual battle. The seventh seal is open, and five trumpets have sounded.

Where are we? John gives us clues. Revelation 9:12 “The first woe is past; two other woes are yet to come.” This tells us we’re transitioning from the first woe which told of the death of one quarter of humanity (as people killed each other and plagues swept the earth) to something else. Something worse than the four horsemen. One fourth was bad enough, remember?

Revelation 6:8 I looked, and there before me was a pale horse! Its rider was named Death, and Hades was following close behind him. They were given power over a fourth of the earth to kill by sword, famine and plague, and by the wild beasts of the earth.

…but now it’s ratcheted up to one third.

Revelation 9: 13 “The sixth angel sounded his trumpet, and I heard a voice coming from the four horns of the golden altar that is before God. 14 It said to the sixth angel who had the trumpet, ‘Release the four angels who are bound at the great river Euphrates.’” 15 And the four angels who had been kept ready for this very hour and day and month and year were released to kill a third of mankind.

Worth noting is that the locusts came from the Abyss. A key kept them locked there until the right time. Locusts, agents of Satan. Now, there are four angels who had been “kept ready” until their time (which is specified as hour, day, month, and year). They’re released to kill a third of mankind.

Revelation 9:16 The number of the mounted troops was twice ten thousand times ten thousand. I heard their number.

Time out. This is not John making it up. A 20 million army is their number. He heard it.

Revelation 9:17 The horses and riders I saw in my vision looked like this: Their breastplates were fiery red, dark blue, and yellow as sulfur. The heads of the horses resembled the heads of lions, and out of their mouths came fire, smoke and sulfur. 18 A third of mankind was killed by the three plagues of fire, smoke and sulfur that came out of their mouths. 19 The power of the horses was in their mouths and in their tails; for their tails were like snakes, having heads with which they inflict injury.

Time out. It’s hard to know what John is describing, but whatever it is, clearly it is injuring people. Killing people. A third of mankind was killed. And here’s the point outside of the pixelated view:

Revelation 9:20 The rest of mankind who were not killed by these plagues still did not repent of the work of their hands; they did not stop worshiping demons, and idols of gold, silver, bronze, stone and wood– idols that cannot see or hear or walk. 21 Nor did they repent of their murders, their magic arts, their sexual immorality or their thefts.

Thoughts for today:

This is one of the saddest descriptions in all of Scripture. People witness this destruction with their own eyes but fail to see that they are in the death throes of sin. (Oh, wake up!!! Realize you’re in real trouble and repent!). Nope. They double down, and dig in their heels.

These events are still future. Compare these to modern culture.

They did not repent of proud human achievements (denying God and exalting man)

They did not stop worshiping false gods and satanic forces (maybe our devotion to celebrities, entertainment watched on TV, or the Internet)

Nor did they repent of their murders. Before you think, “Hey, that’s not widespread”, there is one death that is widely accepted in westernized countries. It starts with an “a” and impacts the most innocent.

Magic arts, sometimes translated sorcery, is actually the Greek word φάρμακον (pharmakon) meaning a drug; magic potion, etc. It’s the Greek root of our word pharmaceutical. Do we diminish the problems of opioids, prevalence of recreational drugs, drug abuse, or addiction in relation to its spiritual connections? Has there been a recent push for legalization of various recreational drugs? How should we view that biblically? What does the culture tell us?

===

If you’re already signed up on my Home Page sidebar to receive posts, you’ll get the 2022 Lent Devotionals automatically. Or you can “Like” Seminary Gal on Facebook and they’ll be delivered to your Facebook news feed. If you haven’t signed up, today is a great day to do so. Advent and Lenten devotionals remain among my most popular offerings. You don’t want to miss this encounter with God to prepare your heart for Easter! Understanding that prior years’ devotionals continue to minister, you may want to have access to a full series ahead of time:

Lent 2013 looked at The Letter to the Romans: Paul’s Masterpiece to reclaim foundations of our Christian heritage and began February 13, 2013.
A very special and ever popular offering was Lent 2014’s Be Still and Know that I AM God which can be obtained through the archives beginning in March 2014.
Lent 2015 began on February 18, 2015 with a series entitled With Christ in the Upper Room: Final Preparations. We explored what is often called “The Upper Room Discourse” found in John chapters 13-17.
ReKindle, the Lent 2016 series, began on February 10, 2016 and encouraged us to rekindle our spiritual lives.
Light: There’s Nothing Like It was the 2017 Lent series and explored this metaphor often used to portray Christ. It is archived beginning March 1, 2017.
Lent 2018, we explored the questions of Pi and Chi (the Greek letter beginning the word Christos, which means Christ, Messiah, the Anointed One). We asked and answered the questions “Why?” from the movie Life of Pi as we discovered the uniqueness of Jesus Christ in a world of many faiths.
Lent 2019 gave us a deeper window into Easter “More to the Easter Story” since we miss so much when we rely only on a superficial understanding of the work of Christ. These devotionals are archived beginning March 6, 2019.
Our Lent 2020 devotional series offered prayer points surrounding “Be Thou My Vision” and were aimed at helping us to see God for who He is. The full set of devotionals are archived beginning February 26, 2020.
The theme for 2021 Lent Devotionals was how to live between two worlds while waiting for Christ’s return. Into the gap between the City of Man and its fixation upon sin and the City of God with its demand for holiness, two words minister peace: But God. Praise God for His intervention! They are archived beginning February 17, 2021.