Two Fates

Read Time: 2 min

Daily Devotional Audio

Today’s texts echo Ezekiel 39:17, 18, in which the Lord warns what would happen to wayward Israel. He calls to the birds, saying, “You shall eat the flesh of the mighty, drink the blood of the princes of the earth.”

How sad that not many verses before, people have been called “to the marriage supper of the Lamb” (Revelation 19:9). They are going to eat a feast with Jesus, who died for them. In contrast, the people here, instead of eating, are going to be eaten. This difficult imagery graphically depicts the fate of the lost at the Second Coming.

“‘I will call for a sword on all the inhabitants of the earth,’ says the LORD of hosts. … And at that day the slain of the LORD shall be from one end of the earth even to the other end of the earth. They shall not be lamented, or gathered, or buried; they shall become refuse on the ground” (Jeremiah 25:29, 33). Jesus’ return marks the death of all those who are not able to withstand the brightness of His coming. During the millennium, there are none to bury the dead; rather, the corpses are left as food for the birds.

But what is the cause? “The earth is also defiled under its inhabitants, because they have transgressed the laws, changed the ordinance, broken the everlasting covenant” (Isaiah 24:5). The attempted tampering with the law of God by haughty Babylon (Daniel 7:25), the rampant violation of the law of God (which is a law of love), has called for such a day of reckoning.

It is not without a good purpose that this cleansing comes. As a plate is wiped clean to prepare the way for a meal, so sin is cleansed to prepare the way for a kingdom of righteousness.

Heavenly Father, I openly and purposely choose You and your salvation. May I be part of the marriage supper of the Lamb.

For Further Study: 1 Peter 3:18; Psalm 79:2; John 3:17

Key Bible Texts

And I saw an angel standing in the sun; and he cried with a loud voice, saying to all the fowls that fly in the midst of heaven, Come and gather yourselves together unto the supper of the great God; (Revelation 19:17 KJV)