VERSE 17-19 “Then another angel came out of the temple which is in heaven, he also having a sharp sickle. And another angel came out from the altar, who had power over fire, and he cried with a loud cry to him who had the sharp sickle, saying, “Thrust in your sharp sickle and gather the clusters of the vine of the earth, for her grapes are fully ripe.” So, the angel thrust his sickle into the earth and gathered the vine of the earth, and threw it into the great winepress of the wrath of God.”
In the first harvest, the harvest of the wheat of the earth (Rev. 14:14–16), Jesus as the Son of man, and as Chief Reaper, is seen sitting upon a white cloud and having a sharp sickle in his hand prepared to harvest the earth. Subsequently he is told to reap the earth as the earth was ripe for harvesting. The angel (messenger of the Lord) commanding him to reap was the none other than the Word of God itself, the Holy Scriptures, more specifically the chronology, the prescribed “times and seasons”. The “due time” having come as outlined according to the Divine Plan, the Lord preceded to reap the earth.
This angel or “time messenger” announced this message not only through means of the prophetic word, but likewise by an additional witness, the Great Pyramid, pictured here as “another angel”, (Angel # 4) coming out of his own special edifice, out of HIS [Sinaitic MS] temple.”
It is the figurative testimonial crying out of the stones (Luke 19:40) of a building or praise-altar witness to the Lord of hosts—namely, the Great Pyramid temple in the land of Egypt.
“In that day (the Day of the Lord, the day of his Parousia [presence]) there will be an altar to the Lord in the midst of the land of Egypt (picturing Christendom), and a pillar to the Lord at its border. And it will be for a sign and for a witness to the Lord of hosts in the land of Egypt …” Isa 19:19, 20
For those in Egypt (Christendom) who are able to receive its testimony (its witness), it has been shown to fully collaborate the divine testimony as given us in the scriptures, chronologically confirming not only the time of the harvest, but the Divine Plan, the “times and the seasons” as a whole. “The passages of the Great Pyramid, leading to its principal chambers, are prophetic time corridors in which each pyramid lineal inch of travel represents a solar year of progress toward a destination and a symbolic fulfillment."
“Now in this second harvest, the harvesting of “the vine of the earth,” a second styled “another angel” (Angel # 5, Verse 17) is seen to come “out of the temple which is in heaven” (perhaps implying the former temple of Verse 15 was on earth).
In each harvest the entity possessing the sickle of truth represents an intelligent guiding force. The angel seen coming out of the temple in heaven in Verse 17 represents a class, namely, the complete and glorified members of the true Church. Together, they share in gathering the “clusters [the various religious denominations] of the vine of the earth [false Christendom]” (Verse 18) preparatory to their final desolation.
This class emerges from the temple in heaven as an “angel” (a) after a prior bundling of the tares or clustering of the grapes of wrath and (b) after the marriage ceremony or wedding of the Lamb.
The third styled “another angel” (Verse 18), seen coming out “from the altar,” is a flashback to the angel of Revelation 8:3–5, who has the golden censer.
Of that angel it is said: “There was given unto him much incense, that he should offer it with the prayers of all saints upon the golden altar…. And the smoke of the incense [with the prayers of the saints] … ascended up before God out of the angel’s hand. And the angel took the censer, and filled it [anew] with fire of the altar, and cast it into the earth: and there were voices, and thunderings, and lightnings, and an earthquake.” This scene portrays Jesus as High Priest on behalf of, first, his Church. When the incense is completely consumed—when the prayers of God’s special elect have been fully offered up and the Gospel Age has thus ended—then that same censer, the ministry of suffering which developed the sainthood, will be used to prepare the world for the Kingdom.
When the wheat is fully garnered into the barn, when the Church is beyond the veil and the harvest of the earth is complete, then Jesus, the angel of the altar who has “power over [the] fire” (Verse 18), will command the angel coming out of the temple of heaven—the exalted Church—to gather the already clustered “vine of the earth” and to cast it into “the great winepress of the wrath of God [the mandated circumstances and conditions that will arise to crush Christendom in its coils]” (Verse 19).”
We will take a look at our alternative interpretation in our next post.
