Fear of the Wrath to Come, Part 2 (Revelation 6:15–17)

Focus Keywords: Day of the Lord, Sixth Seal, God’s Wrath, Great Tribulation, End Times Prophecy, Revelation 6, John MacArthur, Divine Judgment, Cosmic Catastrophe

This rewrite summarizes Pastor John MacArthur’s exposition of Revelation 6:12–17, detailing the cosmic and terrifying events associated with the opening of the Sixth Seal. This seal initiates the Day of the Lord, a prophetic period where the world confronts the unavoidable wrath of God. The message emphasizes that the terror of this event will be universal, forcing all of humanity to acknowledge the truth of divine judgment.

I. The Prophetic Context: Initiating the Day of the Lord

The events of Revelation occur during a future seven-year period known as the time of tribulation. This era is marked by Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God, breaking seven seals on a scroll that details His takeover of the universe.

The first five seals involve judgments stemming partially from human actions, such as false peace, war, famine, pestilence, and vengeance. However, the Sixth Seal marks the culmination and initiation of the “great day of wrath”—a divine intervention that is sudden, shocking, and solely the work of God.

Timing and Imminence:

The Day of the Lord is a frightening, inevitable day in the future. Scripture indicates that God has chosen not to disclose the specific time, age, year, or date when the events associated with the Lord’s return, the Rapture, or the opening of the seals will occur.

• Sudden Arrival: The Day of the Lord will come “just like a thief in the night”—unannounced, unexpectedly, suddenly, and harmfully. Jesus himself stated that this moment is a “secret event known only to God”.
• Widespread Deception: Even during the Tribulation, the world will be listening to false prophets who say, “Peace and safety,” when “destruction will come upon them suddenly”. This deception is so effective that the unbelieving world will not expect the Day of the Lord, despite having witnessed the preceding five seals.
• Prophetic Warnings: Old Testament prophets described the Day of the Lord as a time of “fury,” “vengeance,” and “fierce anger to lay the land desolate”. It is a day of trouble, distress, devastation, desolation, darkness and gloominess.

Phases of Wrath:

The Day of the Lord is so extensive that it comes in two phases, separated by the thousand-year Millennial Kingdom. The first phase begins toward the end of the seven-year Tribulation, and the final phase occurs at the end of the millennium, when the heavens and earth pass away and the new heaven and new earth are inaugurated. Peter explains this extended period by noting that with the Lord, “one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years is as one day”.

II. The Force of the Sixth Seal: Fear and Cosmic Collapse

If the preceding seals focused on physical consequences, the force associated with the Sixth Seal is sheer, paralyzing fear. The world now knows that what they are experiencing is the “work of God”. The sheer terror is so intense that people will literally faint or die from fear.

The cosmic shift described in Revelation 6:12–14 involves six terrifying features that show the universe beginning to disintegrate:

1. A Great Shaking (Seismos): There will be a “great earthquake”, referred to by the Greek word seismos, meaning a severe shaking that affects the entire universe, not just the Earth. This is God’s wrath at full operation.
2. The Sun Becomes Black: The sun will become “black as sackcloth made of hair”. This is likely caused by immense volcanic action or the breaking up of celestial bodies, obscuring the sun with fire and smoke.
3. The Moon Becomes Like Blood: The moon will be totally eclipsed and appear “like blood”.
4. Stars Fall to Earth: “Stars of the sky fell to the earth,” resembling a fig tree casting its unripe figs when violently shaken. This is understood to mean a massive pummeling of the Earth by celestial bodies (asteres), such as asteroids and meteorites, confirming that the heavens are disintegrating.
5. The Sky is Split Apart: The sky will be “split apart like a scroll when it is rolled up,” essentially disappearing as the cosmos breaks up.
6. Mountains and Islands Moved: “Every mountain and island were moved out of their places”. This signifies a severe shifting of the Earth’s crustal layers.

The stability of the predictable sky will instantaneously become unpredictable, generating “terrors and signs in heaven”.

III. Universal Panic and the Desperate Reaction

When this catastrophe occurs, the terror is global and inescapable.

• Range of Fear: The fear encompasses the entire spectrum of humanity. It affects the elite—“the kings of the earth and the great men and the commanders and the rich and the strong”—as well as the common people, divided as “every slave and free man”. Everybody will see and feel it; no one will be left out.
• Hiding in Caves: The unredeemed will hide themselves in caves and among the rocks of the mountains.
• Prayer for Destruction: This leads to the world’s largest prayer meeting, but instead of crying out to God, they pray to the mountains and rocks. They cry out, “Fall on us and hide us from the presence of Him who sits on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb”. They prefer immediate death and destruction to facing God.
• Refusal to Repent: Despite the magnitude of the judgment, the majority of the unredeemed do not repent of their sins (murders, sorceries, immorality, thefts). They have followed the path of Antichrist and are locked in delusion. They acknowledge that “the great day of their wrath has come,” and when asked, “who is able to stand,” the answer is “no one”.