Text: Rev 18:1-24
In the name of + Jesus. Amen.
As world history moves forward in time, our rapid advances in technology fool us into thinking that we are getting better, that the current generation is the culmination of mankind. The reality is the opposite. Instead, evil has become normalized and goodness has been redefined. Reality itself is called to question and considered to be in the realm of the subjective. Goodness, truth, and beauty are malleable. St. John’s apocalyptic Revelation, revealed by none other than our Lord Himself (Rev 1:1) demonstrates not a progressive world, but one that is regressive – even as it glories in its downfall.
In a process that began in the Garden, we see that which is good, even “very good” (Gen 1:31) being corrupted and turned into something hideous. Cities are places where people live together in community. God reveals eternity to us with references to “the city of God” (Ps 46:4-5). Living together in peace and harmony is the ideal city. The name “Jerusalem” means “City of Peace.” But sin has created another city: Babylon. Babylon became the heart of a wicked empire, the capital of a nation and people who rejected God. God used ancient Babylon to chastise His own people, those whose capital was indeed Jerusalem, punishing them on account of their sins of idolatry and rejection of the prophets.
Trade and commerce are likewise good things: using one’s gifts and talents to the best of one’s ability, and then trading the excess of what one produces to benefit mutually. Markets increase the wealth and prosperity of all, but only when done in a godly way, with honest scales and money (Prov 11:1). When money becomes an object of love, every manner of evil is unleashed on the world (1 Tim 6:10).
And so it goes that toward the end of the age, we see sin and corruption taking over the lives of nearly everyone in the world, as all but a remnant have rejected God’s visitation, spurning the Lord’s Christ, and no longer giving heed to the Word of God. Babylon has reemerged in some form or other, a “great” city that “has become a dwelling place for demons, a haunt for every unclean spirit.” Her influence has spread to “all nations” who “have drunk the wine of the passion of her sexual immorality.” And “the merchants of the earth have grown rich from the power of her luxurious living.”
As the end approaches, God’s people, citizens of the kingdom, denizens of the City of God, are called out by a “voice from heaven” that says to us: “Come out of her, My people, lest you take part in her sins, lest you share in her plagues; for her sins are heaped high as heaven, and God has remembered her iniquities.”
Like Sodom, this Babylon is doomed (Gen 19:1-29). Like Lot, we are being called out of this evil city before it is destroyed (Gen 19:15). We must leave Babylon and not look back (Gen 19:17). The “kings of the earth” will say, “Alas! Alas! You great city, you mighty city, Babylon! For in a single hour your judgment has come.” The merchants will lament: “Alas, alas, for the great city that was clothed in fine linen, in purple and scarlet, adorned with gold, with jewels, and with pearls. For in a single hour all this wealth has been laid waste.” The millstone of which Jesus spoke (Matt 18:6) reemerges, thrown “into the sea,” and Babylon will “be thrown down with violence.” For “in her was found the blood of prophets and of saints, and all who have been slain on earth.”
Let us not wait to heed the angelic voice to “Come out of her, My people.”
Amen.
In the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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