The Three Angels’ Messages

three-angels-sm1The great controversy between God and Satan will reach its climax through the preaching of the three angels’ messages (Revelation 14). They are the final invitation to the world, given by God’s remnant people at the end of time. Their purpose is to paint the world with the wonders of God’s character. In singing this truth to all men, they will polarize them into two great camps:

  • Those who trust in Jesus, have entered into the life of the Trinity, and receive the seal of God.
  • Those who choose to believe the lies of Satan, trust in their own works, and receive the mark of the beast.

When this separation of the wheat and the tares is accomplished, probation will close, and Jesus will come to liberate His people.

The First Angel’s Message

The first angel’s message (Revelation 14:6-7) is an appeal to glorify God by living his methods of love, because the hour has come for everyone to make a judgment about God, and worship the Designer, Creator and Builder who made the heavens, the earth, the sea and springs of water–all of which operate upon his law of love. This message demands a choice, effectually severing the true followers of Jesus from those who worship the Beast and her harlot daughters.

The everlasting gospel that this angel brings to the world is the crucial theme of salvation, the only solution to men’s fallen condition and separation from God: the blood of the Lamb. Without the truth and healing of the blood of Jesus, men cannot hope to overcome sin, which is the only prerequisite to surviving in the presence of a sinless God. The blood of Jesus enables us to completely overcome sin.

Satan knows that Christ’s blood is the only way that men can overcome, so he crowds and clouds the minds of men with lies that God is an arbitrary hierarch, an angry punisher, and an executioner.

The Second Angel’s Message

The second angel’s message announces the fall of Babylon (Revelation 14:8). Like Babylon of old, the anti-typical Babylon in the end of time will lead the whole world away from God through a chameleon religious system. Men must be alerted to Satan’s deceptions so that God’s sincere people in all churches may understand the truth about God and join His remnant.

The Third Angel’s Message

The third angel’s message (Revelation 14:9-12) is more dreadful than any other warning God has given to men. The message is clear: Come out of Babylon so you will not receive her judgments. Revelation 18:4 reiterates the message even more clearly saying, “Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues.” It is a message of separation from Babylon, in direct opposition to Babylon’s cries for unity.

The Eternal Choice

The three angels’ messages will thrust a choice about God before every inhabitant of the world. When all have made that choice, probation will close and Jesus will come. This choice—this judgement of God—is what the antitypical Day of Atonement is all about.

God bleeds with us, proving that He longs to deliver us from the body of this death. This deliverance was the purpose of the first coming of Jesus. He is our example. Everything He overcame, we can overcome. This is the message of the three angels’ messages in verity. We can have the faith of Jesus. By faith in Jesus, we can keep God’s law perfectly, as He did.

Those who refuse to worship God with this complete faith will worship the beast instead. Those who will not keep the commandments of God will drink the wine of Babylon instead. The cries of the angels yet ring in this world. Listen carefully while there is yet time. Do not harden your heart.


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