As we see the breaking of the sixth seal, it helps to know that from the
very onset of this book, the Lord had made clear that He would be using symbols
to communicate. He sent the message and signified it unto His servant John.” In
other words, visions in the book of Revelation, such as this one, are symbols
and should not be interpreted literally. In the Old Testament, symbolic
languages such as the sun turning black and moon becoming like blood, had been
used to describe catastrophic events. The writers resort to using vivid symbols
and metaphors because it was hard for them to find the appropriate language to
describe what they were seeing. The opening of the sixth seal is in that kind
of a situation. Hence what we see here is not a literal, worldwide earthquake.
It is a declaration of chaos, a social, political and governmental chaos in the
present order. This is painting for us a breakdown of all proven establishments
that once seemed to be stable.
This is so because, if the natural order like the sky and mountains and
islands are breaking up and folding up, why then is everyone hiding in the
caves among the rocks of the mountains? Everyone, including kings, commanders,
the rich, the strong, the slaves, and free men. What we need to see in the
opening of the sixth seal, that is being communicated, is the portrayal of
political and social turbulence, where there will be wide spread panic. They
realize that they are completely at the mercy of God and there’s nowhere to
protect them from Him who sits on the Throne and the wrath of the Lamb. The
wrath of the Lamb would be so intensified that the question is asked, “Who is
able to stand it?”
Before we go any further, we need to know that if the grace of the Lamb
is rejected, then one will have to be prepared to face the wrath of the Lamb.
The wrath of the Lamb is a contradiction of term. We only know a lamb is gentle,
then how can a lamb has wrath? We need to see it in the light that God, in the
death of the Christ, had demonstrated His anger against sin and evil in man.
And it is the anger of the one who in His own death had embodied the self-giving,
self-sacrificial love of God. The Lamb who came to be sacrificed is now the
Lamb who will come to judge.
As of now, grace is still reigning through righteousness, and a just God
still lovingly and kindly waits to justify everyone who will believe in Jesus.
Someday God will call everyone to give an account of his or her life. The only
people who should fear the wrath of the Lamb, who sits to judge, will be those
who have rejected His call of love.
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