SO WHAT DOES THE BIBLE SAY ABOUT ARMAGEDDON?

To bring about the good news of His Kingdom, God must prepare the world first. The world’s pride must be brought low. Only when the world is humbled, will they be willing to listen to God. The battle of Armageddon is referred to in Revelation 16v16. We are told that this symbolic name should be interpreted “in the Hebrew tongue”. Hebrew is the language of modern Israel. The word “Armageddon” is a combination of 3 Hebrew words:

Arema - A heap of sheaves

Gai - in a valley

Don - for judgement

Armageddon therefore means “a heap of sheaves in a valley for judgement”. Many prophecies in the Bible liken God’s judgement on the nations in the last days to gathering sheaves of wheat to be reaped and threshed. The Bible uses symbols of nature to teach us lessons. The agricultural symbol of a farmer reaping and threshing wheat is used in the Bible to show how God will deal with nations who rebel against Him:

“Thrust in thy sickle and reap: for the time is come for thee to reap, for the harvest of the earth is ripe. And he that sat on the cloud thrust in his sickle on the earth; and the earth was reaped.…” (Revelation 14v16)

God “shall gather them as the sheaves into the floor. Arise and thresh…” (Micah 4v12-13)

“Let the nations be roused; let them advance into the Valley of Jehoshaphat (ie. God’s judgement), for there I will sit to judge all the nations on every side. Swing the sickle, for the harvest is ripe…Multitudes, Multitudes in the valley of threshing. For the day of the Lord is near.” (Joel 3v12-14)

The nations are broken in pieces and “become like the chaff of the summer threshingfloors…” (Daniel 2v35)

“The mountains saw you and writhed. Torrents of water swept by; the deep roared and lifted its waves on high…. In wrath you strode through the earth and in anger you threshed the nations” (Habakkuk 3v10,12)

Armageddon is therefore an Old Testament subject. While not a lot of detail is given in Revelation 16 about the battle itself, we are in effect being told to go BACK TO THE OLD TESTAMENT to find out the full story. If we go back to these chapters we are able to see that Armageddon concerns Israel and Jerusalem, and that the nations will be judged at this time. We ask you to simply read these chapters for yourself. Many of them are self explanatory. For instance read Isaiah 34v1-10, Jeremiah 30v3-11 and Malachi 4.

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