Wrath, Tribulation, and the Big Fish
Some things we just accept.
Grass is green. There is a Creator. No need to prove it. Life has certain givens, basic tenets and fundamental understandings. It’s true because it’s what we’ve been taught and…and…well, because it’s true, that’s all.
In this article, we will dive into the scriptures to either prove or, heavens to Betsy, disprove some cherished theories relating to Bible prophecy.
For example, we all know that the wrath of God is the great tribulation. It’s the time when God pours out His wrath upon an unbelieving world. We read the ugly details in the Seals, Trumpets and Vials of Revelation. Books have been written about it. Movies produced. Institutes established. You’ve heard it taught; you know it’s true. God’s Wrath is the Great Tribulation.
And today, heavens to Betsy, we tear it down.
Ten-hut! Open your Bible to Revelation 6 and Matthew 24. Let’s go fishing.
The Bible speaks of a time when the sun, moon and stars will go dark. The prophet Joel saw it this way: “The earth shall quake before them; the heavens shall tremble: the sun and the moon shall be dark, and the stars shall withdraw their shining… The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and the terrible day of the LORD come” (Joel 2:10, 31).
Here is Isaiah’s description:
Behold, the day of the LORD cometh, cruel both with wrath and fierce anger, to lay the land desolate: and he shall destroy the sinners thereof out of it. For the stars of heaven and the constellations thereof shall not give their light: the sun shall be darkened in his going forth, and the moon shall not cause her light to shine…Therefore I will shake the heavens (Isaiah 13:9-10, 13).
Joel and Isaiah are seeing the same event. Both tell us that the sun, moon and stars will go dark during the “Day of the Lord.” In verse 13, Isaiah gives it a second title. He calls it “the wrath of the Lord.”
John wrote of the same event under the 6th Seal:
And I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, and, lo, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood; And the stars of heaven fell unto the earth…For the great day of his wrath is come; and who shall be able to stand (Revelation 6:12-13, 17)?
We can comfortably conclude from these three scriptures that the sun, moon and stars go dark during the day of the Lord – the great day of God’s wrath. Simple enough. Now let’s reel in our great fish (Jonah 1:17).
Consider the words of Jesus.
He says in Matthew 24:29 concerning the Great Tribulation (v. 15), “Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken.”
Jesus is obviously speaking of the same event spoken of by Joel, Isaiah and John, only He gives us one additional clue -and it is a very important clue. He says that the sun, moon and stars go dark after the Great Tribulation.
Big fish. You see, many have been taught in the past that the Wrath of God is the Great Tribulation. But you have just discovered for yourself that the Wrath of God begins after, yes, after the Great Tribulation.
No matter how pretty their words, no matter how much conviction with which it is delivered, and no matter how famous the teacher… He may say that the sun, moon and stars going dark is just a Hebraic expression that shouldn’t be taken literally… She may suggest the implausibility that 20 million books in print can’t all be wrong… They may tell you that this conclusion contradicts what has been commonly understood by scholars throughout the centuries. But no such logic can change what you now know. God’s Wrath isn’t the Tribulation. It can’t be.
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