This question addresses the timing of the events of Revelation 16:1–21. Many commentators suggest that the events of Revelation 16 lie in today’s future, specifically in the little slice of time just before Christ’s return. The implication would be that these seven angels may not yet have departed from heaven. This is incorrect for the following reasons:
In Revelation 15:1 these seven plagues were described as
the last
. The termlast,
though, does not meanfinal
(time-wise) butultimate,
the most severe expression of God’s wrath.In Revelation 16:1 the angels are instructed to
go
andpour out,
with no indication that they are to linger (as it might turn out, for more than twenty centuries). Instead, they went and poured.Again, in Revelation 16:1 the Greek formulation of the instruction to
go
and topour out
is presented not as a once only activity but as constant, ongoing.
The pouring (with its consequences) happens throughout the new dispensation. This conclusion will have implications for our reading of the rest of the chapter.
1 Then I heard a loud voice from the temple telling the seven angels, “Go and pour out on the earth the seven bowls of the wrath of God.”