Biblion Bible Commentary
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It Is Done
Revelation 16:17-21
17 The seventh poured out his bowl into the air. A loud voice came out of the temple of heaven, from the throne, saying, “It is done!” · WEB
The seventh bowl is poured on the air, the throne says it is finished, the great city splits in three, and hail falls at a talent a stone.
The seventh poured out his bowl into the air. A loud voice came out of the temple of heaven, from the throne, saying, "It is done!"
The last bowl empties into the atmosphere itself — the element everything breathes — and the voice that no one could approach through the smoke Revelation 15:8 pronounces the series' epitaph from the throne: It is done — the finishing word: the mystery sworn to finish Revelation 10:7, the wrath that finishes in the seven Revelation 15:1, done. The cross spoke its own it is finished over sin's price; the throne speaks this one over sin's system — and will speak it once more, in mercy's key, over the new creation Revelation 21:6.
There were lightnings, sounds, and thunders; and there was a great earthquake such as has not happened since there were men on the earth Revelation 16:18 — the throne's storm-signature at its final amplitude Revelation 4:5 Revelation 8:5 Revelation 11:19: each series has ended in this weather, each louder; the last adds the superlative of all seismology, Daniel's time of trouble such as never was Daniel 12:1 in geological form.
The great city was divided into three parts, and the cities of the nations fell. Babylon the great was remembered in the sight of God, to give to her the cup of the wine of the fierceness of his wrath Revelation 16:19.
The great city — Sodom-Egypt-Babylon, the world-order that killed the witnesses Revelation 11:8 — splits in three: the triple alliance of dragon, beast, and false prophet Revelation 16:13 cracking apart at the seams under judgment, the confederacy's unity its first casualty. And the sentence's center is a courtroom verb: Babylon the great was remembered. Through the long era she reigned as if the ledger were lost Revelation 18:7; the book's answer is that nothing was lost — remembered in the sight of God, and served the cup her own hand mixed Revelation 14:8 Revelation 18:6.
Every island fled away, and the mountains were not found Revelation 16:20 — the sixth seal's dissolution Revelation 6:14 completed: geography itself resigning ahead of the face it cannot bear.
Great hailstones, about the weight of a talent, came down out of the sky on people. People blasphemed God because of the plague of the hail Revelation 16:21.
Hail at a hundred pounds a stone — the seventh plague of Egypt Exodus 9:24 at final weight, the stoning the law assigned to blasphemy Leviticus 24:16 executed from the sky on a world blaspheming as it falls. The refrain closes the chapter unchanged: no repentance, only rage — the marked heart's last recorded word. What remains for the book is to walk through the ruin and explain it: the next two chapters are Babylon's autopsy.
held with reason What this mark means