The Seven Bowls of God’s Wrath

In this chapter

In this chapter, you’ll:

Read the text: Rev 15 · Rev 16

Key takeaways

• The seven bowls are final judgments — God’s justice poured out in full. Their pictures come from the plagues of Egypt, which struck a third under the trumpets and struck everything here.
• The world doesn’t repent. It hardens, and that hardness is the book’s explanation for the bowls.
• Armageddon is a real place-name used as a symbol: the place where evil gathers for a battle it has already lost.
• “It is done.” Judgment is complete. The beast’s time is up.
• Even in wrath, God’s hand is steady. The song of Moses and the Lamb is sung before the bowls, and it calls his ways righteous and true.

Reflect & discuss

• Read Revelation 16:1–11 alongside Exodus 7–10. Which plagues on Egypt reappear? What has changed in their scale?
• Heaven’s song in 15:3–4 comes before the bowls. Why do you think John placed worship before judgment rather than after?
• Under the bowls, people “blasphemed the name of God… They didn’t repent” (16:9). What does that reveal about sin’s grip on the human heart — and about how much we need grace?
• The chapter insists this is “righteousness, not rage.” Where do you feel the tension between God’s love and God’s judgment, and what in this chapter speaks to it?
• (Personal; feel free to pass.) Is there an injustice you’ve carried to God that hasn’t been answered? What does “It is done” mean to you in that light?

The last question is personal — no one should be required to answer it.