Chapter Eighteen/Earthquakes in the Lord's Day - The Great Earthquake - Conclusion

 Some 200 years after Joel, the prophet Habakkuk said in a prayer to his God: "O Jehovah, I have heard the report about you. I have become afraid, O Jehovah, of your activity. In O bring it to life! In the midst of the years may you make it know. During the agitation, to show mercy may you remember." What would that agitation be?  Habakuk goes on to give a graphic description of the great tribulation, saying of Jehovah: "He stood still, that he might shake up the earth. He saw, and then, caused nations to leap. . . . With denunciation you went marching through the earth. In anger you went thrashing the nations. Yet, as for me, I will exult in Jehovah himself; I will be joyful in the God of my salvation." (Habakkuk 3:1, 2, 6, 12, 18) What a mighty shaking Jehovah will cause in all the earth when he threshes the nations!

Ezekiel too foretold that when Gog of Magog (the debased Satan) makes his final attack upon God's people, Jehovah will cause "a great quaking" to occur "in the soil of Israel." (Ezekiel 38:18, 19) Though literal earthquakes may be involved, we should remember that Revelation is presented in signs. This prophecy and the other prophecies cited are highly symbolic. Hence, the opening of the sixth seal appears to disclose the culmination of all shakings of this earthly system of things-the great earthquake in which all humans opposed to God's sovereignty are destroyed.

Next time: Chapter Eighteen/Earthquakes in the Lord's Day - A Time of Darkness

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