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Sermon preached on Revelation 19:1-10 by Rev. W. Reid Hankins during the Morning Worship Service at Trinity Presbyterian Church (OPC) on 05/18/2025 in Petaluma, CA.
Sermon Manuscript
Rev. W. Reid Hankins
Last week we started a new section dealing with the fall of Babylon, presented apocalyptically as a great, drunken prostitute who seduced the world into her abominations and immoralities. This Babylon of a woman domineered all the world, resting on the power of the beast until that Satan-influenced beast betrayed her to take complete authority over the earth. While last chapter initially described Babylon’s downfall, today’s passage gives us an extended litany of songs to sing about the coming fall of Babylon. These songs come in the form of classic prophetic oracles of judgment and lament and would be an opportunity for a number of dirges, I’m sure. Let us really appreciate the amount of songs that are here. Revelation has had plenty of songs. But the concentration just went up dramatically. This is a climactic moment, a musical crescendo of judgment.
Remember from last week, that Babylon represents more than just a single historical city, but all such great cities and the power and influence, they represent throughout the world. We noted there have been various such cities down through the ages, imperialistically powerful and tyrannical, economically prosperous lovers of money, hedonistic in gratifying sinful pleasures, practitioners of various false religions, and generally pagan, godless societies. We mentioned examples so far that included not only ancient Babylon, but Sodom, Egypt, Rome, and even Old Jerusalem once it became apostate. This understanding that Babylon here represents all such powers through the years is further confirmed by all the songs in this chapter. For the songs here quote or allude to various Old Testament prophecies that speak about God’s judgments against different cities of the same sort. The main Old Testament references include not only judgments against Babylon, but also against Tyre and apostate Jerusalem, with subtle references to Nineveh and Edom too. This pagan spirit of Babylon yet exists today, and our chapter foretells vividly its coming downfall.
Our chapter can be divided up into three main sections based on the speaker of each section. Verses 1-3 hear from an angel with great and glorious authority. Verses 4-20 hear from a voice from heaven. Verses 21-24 hear from a mighty angel with a millstone. The first and third sections both describe Babylon’s fall, sandwiching the middle section. The middle section has laments that are sandwiched with commands to the saints. Taken together, this beautifully musical chapter is artistically structured as one big chiasm.
Let us begin in verses 1-3 with this glorious angel of great authority that lights up the earth. Quoting Isaiah 21:9, the angel announces the downfall saying, “Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great!” The outcome is pictured in verse 2 that after she falls, she becomes a desolate place, a dwelling for all things unclean. Picture a wasteland of a city full of vultures and jackals picking over carcasses, as well as demons scavenging on any humans that survived. It’s the scene of many post-apocalyptic movies today, picturing cities in such an estate. Babylon will be so utterly demolished when its final judgment comes.
The reason for Babylon’s downfall is then sung about in verse 3. It describes Babylon’s tremendous evil influence on the world. She has gotten so many people “drunk” on her immorality. This is especially true for the kings and the merchants of the earth, but it’s true, it says, for all nations. Babylon perverts all the world with her vices. This especially highlights sexual immorality and a pleasure-indulgent focus of life. Babylon actively promotes that today. Remember, it is bad to sin, but it’s especially evil to make others sin. You might as well as cast a millstone around your neck. (Wait, that’s in verse 21.) The point is that Babylon has spread her many evils throughout the world. She’s a virus, a pandemic, for her abominations.
You may have noticed in this short song that it employs the traditional parallelism that we are accustomed to seeing in biblical poetry. But you might have noticed that its lines are not in the more common doublets but in the emphatic triplets. In other words, normally, the parallelism has two lines in parallel, but here it uses three lines in parallel. In verse 2 there was the triple haunt reference. In verse 4, it was the triple reference to whom Babylon perverted. This is another way that puts an exclamation point on these songs.
Let us turn next to verses 4-20 with this voice from heaven, which is the largest section. This voice not only sings about Babylon’s fall and our needed response, but also tells us about the songs of those who will lament Babylon’s fall. As mentioned, the structure has three laments in the middle with songs sandwiching the laments. The kings lament in verses 9-10. The merchants lament in verses 11-17. The seafarers lament in verses 18-19. The opening song from this voice in heaven is in verses 4-8, and the closing short song is in verse 20 (which may be hard to tell from the pew Bibles.) The opening and closing song both include a command to God’s people, and application, we could say.
Start with the laments. This envisions what these three groups of people will sadly sing about when Babylon is destroyed. Let us appreciate that these people groups especially stood to prosper from Babylon. The kings of the earth were previously in cahoots with Babylon. They had a mutual arrangement of power that while she was in power they were in power and vice versa. It imagines the kings in some promiscuous relationship with her that savored in the luxuries of the world even as surely they enjoyed such as their oppressive domineering of the world. Imagine a world oligarchy of power represented by the close relationship with the kings and Babylon. Interestingly, last chapter mentioned how ten kings would turn against her before giving their authority to the beast. Does this lament include those kings who thought turning against her would be good yet maybe now they realized they are going to end up losing their power and privilege too? Maybe. The merchants stood to prosper by all their valuable treasures and commodities that they traded. Babylon, despite all its problems, wielded a prosperous economic machine. The lament especially describes how Babylon herself craved all these treasures, she was their primary customer, so to speak. So, now that she is gone, so will be all their wealth. Let us note that not all their trading was morally neutral, as we see their trafficking of slaves, human souls, mentioned in verse 13. Babylon breeds merchants that make money without any moral qualms. If you think this isn’t still true, let me remind you of the pornography industry as one example that is sadly alive and well still. The third group, the shipmaster, seafarers, and sailors conducted the actual transportation of these goods that the merchants traded. This reminds us of the trickledown effects when an economy collapses. If the merchants all go out of business, so will the closely connected maritime industry that powered their operations. Verse 19 speaks of how these shipmasters and sailors grew rich from Babylon’s wealth. We can hear in that the vice of greed, that love of money. In contrast, we remember Jesus’ counsel that if you set your heart on earthly wealth you can lose it, but if you heart is set on heavenly treasure, you can’t lose it if you gain it. It’s an interesting contrast that the New Jerusalem pictured in chapter 21 is also adorned with gold and other jewels. But the riches themselves have never been the problem. It’s the love of money as well as its pursuit without any moral restrictions which has always been condemnable.
Notice that each of these laments has some common features. First, they all recognize the great woe that has come upon Babylon. That’s what is meant when they each cry, “Alas! Alas!” The word for alas is literally the word for “woe”, describing the cursed outcome that has befallen Babylon. They express shock and dismay at what happens to Babylon. Second, each lament also involves sorrow. They weep and wail and mourn. They all grieve what happened to Babylon and surely how it will negatively affect them. Third, each lament also recognizes how suddenly this downfall happened to Babylon, because they each use the same refrain of, “For in a single hour,” this judgment happened. That is what the Bible warns, how judgment will catch the wicked off guard and when it comes it will be swift and terrible.
Lastly, notice that each lamenter is afraid what happened to Babylon is going to happen to them. We see that, because each says they “stand far off”. They do this, “in fear of her torment”. They are right to be so afraid. The application is again implied here to the non-Christian. You need to repent of your sins and turn to Jesus to find salvation. You need to do this before it is too late. Receive God’s grace before it is no longer offered.
Now I want to return to what sandwiches these laments, verses 4-8 and verse 20. Again, they each include a command to God’s people, an application to us Christians, in light of Babylon’s fall. The first is there in verse 4. Come out of her, my people. Christians are called to come out Babylon. Lot needed to leave Sodom. Israel needed to exit Egypt. Likewise, we need to come out of Babylon. There are two related concerns here in verse 4. We need to come out of Babylon, lest we share in her sins and in her plagues. The rest of this song in verses 5-8 describes how all Babylon’s sins are going to result in her getting what she deserves. She’s going to get divine payback for all the evil that she has one. We don’t want her to tempt us into embracing a life of sin, the very sin that has made her so liable to judgment. Nor do we want to be in her when the fire finally falls.
Yet, that visual metaphor of Lot fleeing Sodom is only partially helpful for us. Because Christians are called to be in but not of the world in these last days. That’s not only the message of the New Testament in general, it is the message especially of the book of Revelation. Next chapter concludes this section saying that we Christians have been entrusted with the testimony of Jesus which is the spirit of prophecy. So, this idea of coming out of Babylon is a spiritual and moral command, not a geopolitical one. Christ doesn’t want us to try to escape from the world by finding some island where we can live isolated from the rest of the world. Otherwise, how we can we bring the testimony of Jesus to the world? Indeed, this chapter reminds us how Babylon persecutes us Christians, but that wasn’t given as a reason to come out of her, because we aren’t to come out of Babylon in that sense. But we have to be greatly on guard for the temptation she will bring to us. Don’t fall into marveling her wily enticements. Don’t have anything to do with her sins. Remember, she will try to seduce you. She will try to sell herself and her ways as beautiful and good, ways of so-called justice and freedom. But don’t fall under her spell and don’t believe her lies. We need to morally and spiritually come out of her. We need to have nothing to do with her and her ways. Remember Psalm 1. Don’t walk in the counsel of Babylon, don’t stand in her way, don’t sit in her seat. We have to be here, engaged in the world, present yet standing apart, not afraid to be different to the world’s eyes.
The other command is there in the closing song of this middle section. Verse 20, rejoice over her. Not only is heaven, along with all the church triumphant, to rejoice over the Babylon’s downfall, but also us Christians here on earth. Surely, we don’t wish God’s damnation on anyone. We are called to love our enemies and seek their salvation. We are trying to warn them to flee the coming judgment. Yet, at the same time, when the dust clears, and God is victorious over this whoring world, we should rejoice. We rejoice in God’s victory and praise him for it. We also rejoice that we are saved from a world that hated us and wanted us dead.
What a contrast from the three-fold lament that surely sparked the tone of a dirge by the kings, merchants, and sea-farers! In contrast, Christians are commanded to rejoice at the judgment of God against a pagan world. For the world, judgment day will be a weeping and gnashing of teeth when they are confronted by the God that they rejected all their lives. For the Christian, judgment day is the day of our salvation being finalized. The application that comes at this moment, then, becomes one of prophetic anticipation and hope. We hope in joy in the coming salvation when Babylon is finally destroyed and ultimately all God’s enemies are finally put down. That coming joy will be further expanded especially next chapter with a four-fold Hallelujah course at the victory of the Lamb!
The third and last section of this chapter is in verses 21-24. This mighty angel essentially acts out an apocalyptic parable by throwing a great millstone into the sea. The angel then explains what that represents with this closing song. So will Babylon the great city be thrown down with violence. This song then features a six-fold refrain of what will be no more in Babylon. Babylon will be no more. Music will be no more. Craftmanship will be no more. Food will be produced no more. Lamps will shine their light no more. Love and marriage will be no more. Realize those six things are not sinful things, in themselves. As evil as Babylon was, there were many ordinary, good things of life that happened. People sung. People laughed. People loved. Things that Ecclesiastes describe as a blessing from God (2:24, 9:7).
But as Ecclesiastes also warns, at the end we must all face the judgment of God. Babylon not only engaged in these normal good things of life. They also did all the evils we’ve mentioned, along with the ones called out here in this final song in verses 23-24. One sin it alludes to by referencing the merchants being the great ones of the earth. Based on other passages, this speaks against the rich and powerful of the world that sinfully exalt themselves above others at their expense. A second sin says Babylon used sorcery to deceive the world. Any such magic or occultic practices is evil. Interestingly, the word for sorcery in Greek is literally about drug use for such purposes. That is certainly another way Satan has empowered Babylon to deceive people, with the use of mind-altering drugs to enslave people. The last sin mentioned here is Babylon’s guilt in shedding the blood of Christians, and additionally, all the murders that have been committed in the world. Babylon is guilty for all such bloodshed.
So, this song considers how Babylon enjoyed the normal blessings of life alongside its many sinful abominations. They will find that they lose both in the end. But if we can enjoy life’s normal blessings within the recognition that Jesus is Lord, trusting in him for mercy and grace, then we will know his salvation at the end.
Trinity Presbyterian Church, today we sing of such serious matters. May none of us be of Babylon. If you are of Babylon, come out of her now. If you are tempted to join with Babylon, wake up today. No temptation has seized you except what is common to man, and God is faithful, he will always provide a way out so you can escape from it. Let us stand apart as a witness. Let us testify to Babylon of Jesus. Babylon yet whores in this world. She yet tempts us with things like sex, money, fame, power, drugs, sinful but alluring lifestyles, and more. She wants you to join with her or she will hate you. She offers you the choice to believe on her or be cast off from her. Don’t listen to her. Don’t prostitute with her but wait for when we the church will be wed to Christ. Indeed, remember all these songs today. In hope, we can already believe Babylon’s future is fallen. If we fall for her, we will fall with her. Let us not fall with her, but stand with all the saints in the joy of our salvation. Come quickly, Lord Jesus,
Amen.
Copyright © 2025 Rev. W. Reid Hankins, M.Div.
All Rights Reserved.
