CHAPTER SIX

Part 3

The Terrible Winepress of the Wrath of God

Far from being forever meek and gentle toward sinners, God declares in Isaiah 63:3:  I will tread them in mine anger, and will trample them in my fury, and their blood shall be sprinkled upon my garments, and I will stain all my raiment (clothing).****  How chilling! One day God’s forbearance with sinners will end, and at Armageddon Christ will stain His own garments with the blood of those enemies of His who refused to have their sins cleansed away by His own blood!  Let’s look at the entire passage, with my personal comments and  parallel verses from Revelation inserted.

Isaiah 63:1  Who is this that cometh from Edom, with dyed garments from Bozrah?  This that is glorious in his apparel, traveling in the greatness of his strength?  I that speak in righteousness, mighty to save?*****Who else is mighty to save but Jesus?  He alone is our Savior. In this context Christ appears in dyed garments. But what color are these garments dyed, and with what are they dyed?

Isaiah 63:2  Wherefore art thou red in thine apparel, and thine garments like him that treadeth in the winefat?  Parallel verse: Revelation 19:13  And he (Jesus) was clothed with a vesture dipped in blood: and his name is called the Word of God.

Isaiah 63:3  I have trodden the winepress alone, and of the people there was none with me: for I will tread them in mine anger, and trample them in my fury; and their blood shall be sprinkled upon my garments, and I will stain all my raiment. Parallel verse: Revelation 19:15  And out of his (Jesus’) mouth goeth a sharp sword, that with it he should smite the nations: and he shall rule them with a rod of iron: and he treadeth the winepress of the fierceness and wrath of Almighty God.

Isaiah 63:4  For the day of vengeance is in mine heart, and the year of my redeemed is come.******Think Jesus doesn’t believe in taking vengeance on His enemies?  The time for that is indeed coming. In Luke Chapter 19,  Jesus, in the parable of the ten pounds, compares Himself to a king who went away to receive for himself a kingdom.  He has returned to get an accounting of his servants’ stewardship. In verse 27 King orders His enemies to be executed in Luke 19:27:  But these mine enemies, which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither and slay them before me.

Isaiah 63:5 And I looked, and there was none to help; and I wondered that there was none to uphold: therefore my own arm brought salvation unto me; and my fury, it upheld me.

Isaiah 63:6  And I will tread down the people in mine anger, and make them drunk in my fury, and I will bring down their strength to the earth.*****At Armageddon sinners are forced to drink of the wine of God’s fury.  A parallel passage is Revelation 14:14-20, where unrepentant sinners are harvested by the angels and thrust into the terrible winepress of the wrath of God Almighty:

Revelation 14:14  And I looked, and behold a white cloud, and upon the cloud one sat like unto the Son of man, having on his head a golden crown, and in his hand a sharp sickle. ****Jesus is referred to as the Son of man several times in the Gospel of Matthew (see Matt. 24:44). 

Rev.14:15  And another angel came out of the temple, crying with a loud voice to him that sat on the cloud, Thrust in thy sickle, and reap; for the time is come for thee to reap; for the harvest of the earth is ripe.

Verse 16  And he that sat on the cloud thrust in his sickle on the earth, and the earth was reaped.

Verse 17  And another angel came out of the temple which is in heaven, he also having a sharp sickle.

Verse 18  And another angel came out from the altar, which had power over fire; and cried with a loud cry to him that had the sharp sickle, saying, Thrust in thy sharp sickle, and gather the clusters of the vine of the earth; for her grapes are fully ripe.

Verse 19 And the angel thrust in his sickle into the earth, and gathered the vine of the earth, and cast it into the great winepress of the wrath of God.

Verse 20  And the winepress was trodden without the city, and blood came out of the winepress, even unto the horses’ bridles, by the space of a thousand and six hundred furlongs (some 200 miles).

Just reading these passages brings to mind a picture of the Lamb-turned-Lion Jesus, with indignation  blazing in His eyes because mankind has finally rejected His offer of mercy and defiled His Father’s planet with sins too horrible to fathom.  Notice, especially, God isn’t merely irked by mankind’s sin.  He is so furious He is about to trample out the grapes of wrath until His garments are stained red.  Many suppose that when Christ speaks of His vesture dipped in blood (Rev.19:13),  He means only the blood He shed on Calvary for the sins of mankind.  But this time it will be His enemies’  (Isaiah 63:3) blood on His clothes.  Christ came the first time as the Lamb of God to save mankind, but the second time it will be as the Lion of the Tribe of Judah, to punish sinful mankind for their rejection of His mercy.

On the Day of Judgment God will be so far from pitying the sinner He will actually LAUGH at the destruction which falls upon hardened, unrepentant sinners (Proverbs 1:24-chap.). God will actually laugh in mockery when calamity comes to the sinner who caused calamity in his lifetime. The same thing is reiterated in Psalms 2:4:  He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh:  the Lord shall have them in derision.   Bullies might spend their entire lives laughing at God and His seeming indifference to their sin but God will turn the tables on them and have the last and longest laugh of all!  Whatever a sinner sows he shall also reap (Galatians 6:7).

Shocking scriptures, but  I didn’t make them up. They’re  right out of the Word of God.  Jesus Christ, Who is One with the Father, will one day rejoice that His Father has been glorified in His perfect execution of judgment on the ungodly.  This temporary dispensation of mercy does not mean that His nature has changed from one dispensation to the next.  Jesus Christ the same, yesterday, today and forever (Hebrews 13:8).

The best way I can reconcile the gentle Jesus with His future role as soon-coming Trampler of the Grapes of Wrath is this:  the old carrot and stick approach.  It seems God has put His stick on the shelf for awhile.  During the  2000 years of the Church Age, mercy has rejoiced over judgment (James 2:13).  God has tried to woo the souls of men to Himself by offering them the carrot (love and mercy).  Throughout this long dispensation of Grace He has sent His rain of blessing on both the righteous and unrighteous (see Matt. 5:45). God has told His children to pray for their enemies and to love them (Matt. 5:44.).  That really takes the power of the Holy Spirit, doesn’t it?  But what do you mean by "love"? There are times love must be tough.  Love must take a stand against wickedness and stand for righteousness. If you see a teenage thug ripping the clothes off a frightened girl, you must do all in your power to protect her from being raped.  And as for praying for a bully, what blessing should you pray on him?   You should pray that God will save the bully, so he will know the blessing of forgiveness and eternal life through Jesus. But you don’t have to pray the same type of blessing on him that you would on a Christian.  You would pray that God gives your Christian friend an open door for service.  But you don’t have to pray for the bully to have an open door to get behind the driver's seat and steal someone's car. You don’t have to pray that the bully will have a fun time serving satan.  You don’t have to pray some blessing on your enemy which would empower him to serve satan more effectively. You would ask God to bless your Christian friend’s business.  but you don’t have to pray that God will bless the bully’s bullying business as he looks for more victims to terrorize.

Sometimes God disciplines His own children for their own good, when they go astray or rebel. David was humble enough to write: It is good for me that I have been afflicted, that I might learn thy statutes (Psalms 119:71). And if discipline is good for  people who serve the Lord,  why on earth isn’t it good enough for a wicked bully?  Why should cruel sinners get preferential treatment if God expects responsible behavior from his own children?   God just might need to use a little tough love on the bully to wake him up in case he gets hit by a bus and goes straight to hell.  In one way or another the bully must learn not only about the sweetness of the love of Jesus, but about the awful judgment of God which shall fall upon all those who disregard that tender love and reject Christ.  Jesus didn’t go around soothing evil men to sleep with warm and fuzzy lullabyes.  When Jesus fought against sin He pulled no punches. He said, Except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish (Luke 13:3).  God wants to save a vicious bully’s soul, not shower him with Hershey’s Kisses while he’s mugging a defenseless old man.

So far as this wicked planet is concerned, God has put His stick away for a time, but He has not thrown it out for good. A wise mother will focus on tender love but she is also realistic. She wishes with all her heart her love could always be happy and smiley. But sometimes her toddler will pitch such a fit she'll stop whatever else she's doing and get to the bottom of the problem before the conflict escalates. That’s tough love. The most rebellious lost souls won’t respond to sweetness and gentleness  only.  God is about the go get His hickory stick out of the cupboard to give the nations a hard thrashing for turning Planet Earth into one big Sodom.  Today God sends rain on both the just and the unjust (Matt.5:45).   But when Christ reigns over all the earth He will no longer bless disobedient nations with rain (Zechariah 14: 17-19).

Bullies: Receptacles of God’s Wrath

In their zeal to shout from the rooftops:  "JESUS LOVES YOU!", politically correct preachers often overlook one very sobering truth. One which limited human understanding finds difficult to reconcile with a God of Love Who is supposed to be impartial in the way He dispenses mercy: Some people are predestined to be vessels (containers) of honor while others are  vessels  of destruction. It seems unspeakably unfair, but that's what the Bible says.  The  bully, like the Pharaoh who oppressed the Israelites, is a vessel of destruction, who  treasures up (stores up) wrath which will fall full force upon his head on the Day of God’s wrath and judgment (Romans 1:18; 2:-9).  Payday may be a very long time in coming to the bully, but every insult and every evil deed only guarantees him a fatter check from the heavenly Paymaster. On that dreadful day the sinner will find it no laughing matter to be a vessel of wrath destined for destruction.  God’s only purpose for this container will be to fill it to overflowing with His terrible, fierce wrath, which shall burn like an oven until His enemies are totally consumed (Malachi 4:1). God will gather in the wheat and burn the chaff, which is useful only as kindling for the fire (Luke 3:17). Far better for a bully to dare to be different and repent, so he can become instead a vessel of honor fit for honorable use in the hand  of the Master, someone Christ can fill to overflowing with His Spirit and all the treasures of His goodness and grace. Eternal treasures are lightly regarded by the cool crowd, but are the only ones which will last for eternity (Matt. 6:19-21).

In Romans Chapter 9 Paul sets forth Pharaoh as an example of a man God chose before the foundation of the world to be a vessel of wrath destined for destruction (verse 22).  God’s purpose for the existence of the vessel of wrath is that through executing righteous judgment upon the  basest of sinners God might demonstrate the greatness of His mercy toward the vessels of honor. Once I made a patchwork quilt of many brightly colored squares.  I sewed a black border around it, and because of the darkness of the border the colors looked that much more beautiful. It's hard to understand now, but in witnessing God’s severity toward impenitent sinners our own salvation from eternal damnation will appear that much sweeter to us and God will receive an abundance of grateful praises from us, His redeemed saints.

In Romans 9:15, Paul reiterates God’s message to Moses in Exodus 33:19: I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.*** Mercy,  compassion, and grace are God’s personal property and it’s His prerogative to decide how to dispense them, and to whom.  I believe the same principle applies for the atoning Blood of Christ.  Somebody still owns this priceless Commodity.  That One is God the Father, Who received it when His Holy Son sprinkled it on the Mercy Seat in heaven as an atonement for our sins (Hebrews 9:12). Be careful of your attitude toward the precious Blood of Jesus!  It is your red lifeline to eternal life, the only hope you’ll ever have of being allowed access to the Presence of a Holy God. Peter gives a solemn admonition to believers in II Peter 1:10:  Give diligence to make your calling and election sure.  For if ye do these things, ye shall never fall.  The clear implication is it is possible to fall even after becoming a believer.  How much more perilous is the position of the hardened bully who has only contempt for the things of righteousness!

Predestination to eternal salvation is a deep mystery of God which only He fully fathoms. If it weren't in the Word of God, I would question predestination as being a valid doctrine, since at first glance it seems glaringly unfair. But God does have foreknowledge of who will receive Christ and who won't. On the  one hand you have salvation offered freely to all mankind.  And whoever receives Christ and faithfully follows Him into heaven is obviously one of God’s vessels of honor.  But sinners who keep saying "no" to the gentle drawing of the Spirit of God will one day discover that He has ceased to deal with them about their need for redemption and has turned His back on them forever (Genesis 3:16). The hardest thing for me to comprehend is that God has a purpose even for the vessels of dishonor who reject His Son.  It is a dreadful role to fill, with an awful reward vastly different from what the true believer in Christ will receive for his honorable life of service. What you sow you shall reap. A bully is only out to gratify his own powerlust and he sows lots of hurt. Apart from Christ, his greatest hope is that he has a crop failure at reaping time. Yet if a violent person is always shielded from the consequences of his actions, does he ever truly learn the fear of the Lord?]

Ezekiel 33:7-9  declares that the wicked are doomed unless the faithful watchman warns the wicked to turn from his wicked way. God tells his servant to "warn them from Me."  God did not say: "Tell that bully Jesus loves him so much that He'll look the other way if he feels like stabbing the other kid in the corridor." No, the bully, like all other criminals, is in deep trouble unless he is brought to a repentant faith in Christ which leads to forsaking his wicked way.  It might be politically incorrect to warn him of the judgment of hell, but you do him no favor by selling him soft soap religion which doesn't require repentance.

Some teach that since we are saved by grace and not through our own good works, there is nothing at all we can do to help ourselves, even to ask God to save us. There is a false teaching going around that one need not even pray for salvation, and all that is needed is silent assent in the heart to what Christ has done on our behalf.  But in Acts 8:22, Peter rebukes Simon Magus and advises him to PRAY for God’s forgiveness.  With our mouth confession is made unto salvation (Rom. 10:10), and the only excuse for omitting this step of salvation would be if a person were mute.  The doctrine of passive assent  even relieves the sinner of the responsibility to do his own repenting.    The Son of God goes out to seek and to save that which was lost, but it was the Prodigal Son who went home to his father.  In turning back, he repented.  The word "repent" is an ACTION verb, not a mere sentiment.  "Repent" comes from the Latin re+pentare, which means to "turn again".  Repentance is an act of the will. WHOSOEVER WILL may come to the Fountain of Living Waters, Christ Jesus, and be born anew (Rev. 22:17). In this darkened era, the very notion of sin is questioned. But bullies will be forever lost and sealed in sin unless they learn that there is a sin they need to be forgiven of, and a hell they need to avoid.  It behooves each person  to act responsibly toward God on his own behalf, and by God's grace, to make his or her own calling and election sure.

Pray for and Bless Those Who Curse You_

But Beware of Which Blessing You Pray Upon them

What you sow you always reap.  Praying for your enemies can best be described as praying that the Lord of the Harvest will give them a crop failure for the evil seeds they sowed instead of their having to reap the full consequences of their evil actions. But sometimes sinners will never learn that there is a hell to be feared unless they are allowed to suffer a little in this world.  I have heard of cases where convicted murderers being led  out of the courtroom have mocked  the grieving relatives of their victims, especially when they got off lightly.  Why should those hurting people pray that God will bless some son of satan with an easy life of bliss? Why pray for God to bless our enemies with more strength to hurt more people?  Some people are so wicked they will only take their resources and use them as weapons of evil. Do we expect God to throw out the red carpet for creeps who boast that they are immune from retribution?  The woman taken in adultery was forgiven by Jesus. As to what happened to her afterward, the Bible is silent. Perhaps her own husband never forgave her, but she at least escaped a negative harvest of stones reaped for sowing sin.  But what if she had laughed all the way to the place of execution, boasting that even if she died for her adultery, if she had to do it all over again, she would still sleep with the other guy?  I doubt Jesus would have intervened if she’d had such a wicked attitude toward her own need for redemption from sin!

The Bullied Bird

Even in nature the law of sowing and reaping holds true, consistently, season after season.  My mother wrote me about one woman who had to repair a section of the back of her house.  There were gaps in the masonry that needed to be filled in with fresh cement.  In one crevice she  found a bird’s nest with baby chicks in it, waiting for their mother to bring them food.  Some friends of hers were with her at the time.  One of them pleaded with the woman to take the bird’s nest out first before she filled in the hole.  Instead, she just plastered it in, covering up the baby birds and laughing as if it were a joke.  The mother bird got back.  The tiny creature scratched away at that spot for hours, struggling to get to her babies.  The woman made fun of the bird, who must have felt grief as well as anxiety.

I knew this woman personally.  She had been very nice to me ever since I’d known her, and she never would have bullied any human being.  But she thought it was no big deal for an animal to suffer.

God views it differently.  In Old Testament Law He even makes provision for the humane treatment of animals. In Leviticus 22:28, people are forbidden to slaughter both the cow and her calves in one day. Deuteronomy 22:6-7 says that if we take the eggs from a bird’s nest to eat, we must let the mother bird go.  If we treat animals humanely, we prolong our days upon the earth. The inference is clear:  Cruelty, even toward animals, shortens your days upon the earth.

 Now if God is so concerned about animal welfare that He shortens the days of animal abusers, why shouldn’t he be even more furious with those who abuse other human beings made in His own image?

Right after her abuse of the bird the woman I spoke of began to suffer ill health.  She got cancer and needed surgery for it.  She lost her zest for life and didn’t enjoy going out with her friends anymore.  And someone reminded her:  “See?  I told you you’d get paid back for being cruel to that little bird.” 

Prophetic Message

Christ:  A Lamb And A Lion

Psalms 7:11; 97:10;   John 1:29; I Cor. 16:22; I John 3:8;

Rev. 2:6, 5:5; 6:1; 15; 19: 11-18

Some Christian scholars make the mistake of trying to cram Me into a box of their own making, which doesn’t extend beyond the limits of their own understanding.  This may seem contradictory, but Christ is portrayed in Scripture as both a Lamb and a Lion.  It is a common misconception that I am so meek I never raise My voice and never get angry, even at the worst sinners.  My love, it is thought, simply won’t permit that. I am expected to be a quiet mouse standing helplessly by on the sidelines watching satan do his dirty work unopposed.

For thousands of years I have dealt in restraint toward this wicked world, giving all men an opportunity to turn from their sins and choose life eternal.  I came the first time as a sacrificial Lamb to atone for the sins of the world.  But My lamblike nature doesn’t make Me hate sin any less. Why would I have come to this earth to destroy the works of the devil if My patience and tolerance knows no bounds? Why shouldn’t you and I hate what the devil is doing to damn souls to an eternity in hell?  You are called to be a spiritual warrior, not a nodding diplomat holding peace talks  with the devil!

Soon I am returning to take My rightful place as King of kings, and it is then the Lionlike aspect of My nature will be fully manifest.  I will uproot the wicked from this planet, and cast them into outer darkness, because they hated the Light and fought to snuff it out.  Light cannot co-exist peacefully with darkness, anymore than a  brothel  can be consecrated to be used for My glory.

Hate the sin, but love the sinner.  By all means, warn such a one in compassionate love.  Many will continue to scoff and throw My gracious offer of salvation back into My face.  Some consider the consecrated Christian a crank and a nuisance to civilized society.  But when I shall appear to take My loved ones out of this decaying world, countless sinners will curse themselves for being so blind to the truth.

Don’t ever let some well-meaning “Bible expert” tell you it’s not okay to hate evil!

God’s Arrows are Aimed at the Heart of the Wicked

Deut.32:22-23; Psalms 2:4-5; 7:11-13; 11:5; 16; 37:12-15; 45:3-7; Prov. 1:24-31;

Isaiah 13:6-11;  63:3-6; Zech. 2:8; Romans 2:5-6; 9:22;

II Pet. 3:7; Rev. 19:11-16

You who brag about your coolness and your invincibility as you prey on the weak and defenseless, I am about to break you in pieces!  Some of those you have harassed and hurt are My children.  It matters not in My sight that  you are often ignorant of which ones are believers in Christ.  When you hurt the least  of these My little ones, you touch the apple of My eye and will by no means be held innocent.  Your whining pleas of “I didn’t know any better, Lord”  will not mitigate My fury when I unleash My  firestorm of judgment to fall upon your heads.  It will be much less painful for the people of Sodom and Gomorrah on the dread Day of Judgment than it will be for you, who had countless chances to repent of your sins and accept Christ as Savior before  My Coming!

Those who love violence and hate righteousness My soul loathes.  My arrows are being readied upon the string of My bow to strike you with calamities when you least expect it.  As an arrow whizzes through the air and strikes dead the enemies of the King of the Realm, so will you reap the fruit of your own wicked ways, sometimes gradually but at other times with a swift suddenness which will overwhelm you.

When your victims cried for you to leave them alone all you did was mock their pleas for mercy and hurt them some more. You kicked them when they were down.  You afflicted an already broken heart, so you yourself will be broken into many pieces. Yea, saith God, I will grind your proud, evil hearts to powder like a miller grinds coarse wheat grains into fine flour.  I will  trample you in My fierce wrath and fury, just as grapes are trampled to squeeze out the wine. You thought it was funny, seeing the school scapegoat cringing away from the crowd you were so proud to be a part of.  And when you graduated to  the world of work, you used your cruel tongue as a sharp sword to stab My children in the back.

You are of no use except to be a vessel of wrath fitted to destruction:  something for Me to pour out My wrath into.  And the awful fierceness of that wrath is going to overwhelm you infinitely more than you overwhelmed your victims with gut-wrenching fears which drove some of them to take their own lives.  I will deal much more leniently with your dead victims than I will deal with you murderers who drove them to early graves.  You laughed about the cheap entertainment you gained by bullying others, so I will laugh at you when your judgment falls upon your wicked heads!  You who trampled so merrily on others and showed no mercy, will be trampled upon like dog dung  in My fury.  Because you lightly esteemed the blood of your victims your blood shall be upon your own head when I repay you in kind for the misery you sowed in the lives of others.

How horrible it will be for you when angels usher you into My Presence for judgment. Because you have ignored My pleas for repentance toward Me and faith in My Son Jesus, I will shut My ears to your pleas for clemency. I will have the last and loudest laugh of all as you finally roast in hell for all the wickedness you have committed on Planet Earth.  I will have you in derision, all you cruel persecutors of weak, defenseless souls, you cowards who beat up elderly pensioners and rob them in their own homes because you do not fear the limp-wristed laws of your land! The smoke of your everlasting burnings  shall ascend before My Throne in heaven both day and night.  The tragic scent, so pungent with sulfur and so undiminished by the rolling passage of millions of ages, will be sweet to My children because it will remind them forevermore that I loved them enough to perform a sad but necessary task I took no pleasure in_destroying  souls whom I created for life and not for death.

I’ve Got Your Number, Punkster!

So you wicked punksters boast that modern technology has given you yet more power over your victims?  You have used your cell phones and computers to torment and harass the weak and the innocent at all hours of the day and night so that he or she gets no peace even in their own homes.   I am against you, saith the Almighty.  I am not impressed by your puny little scientific advances in mischief-making. I’ve got technology up here in heaven you’ve never even dreamed about and your primitive toys are nothing in My sight.  I record your every motion, your every evil thought, I know what you’re about to do even before you take the first step toward carrying out your latest plot against your sacrificial victim.  My how your daddy satan loves the sacrifices you make to him, in torturing the weak and driving them to desperation and sometimes even suicide.  How proud you are of yourselves when you carry out such a “clean” murder as to bully someone into their own grave!

Well, you shall not escape My just wrath.  You brag about the crimes you record on your puny little toys but the day will come when you will view a multi-dimensional full-color replay of all the rotten things you ever did since you were tiny children old enough to know right from wrong.  I will requite you in kind for all your wickedness after your private screening of your own sins is finished!  This time it will be YOU, the nasty bully, who sweats his guts out in terrible fear too deep for words...not the person you outnumbered and beat up on the sidewalk or the little old lady you mugged outside the bus station for pocket change. 

Do not flatter yourself that you’ll be hanging around much longer to create more and more trouble till you’re a gray-haired old man yourself.  I’ve got your number, punkster, and when your number’s up, your appointment with your terrible JUDGE will arrive with a vengeance!