Devotional 19 April 2025

April 19, 2025 • Steve Torres

Revelation 5:4-5.jpg

"After this I saw another angel coming down from heaven, having great authority, and the earth was made bright with his glory. And he called out with a mighty voice, “Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great! She has become a dwelling place for demons, a haunt for every unclean spirit, a haunt for every unclean bird, a haunt for every unclean and detestable beast. For all nations have drunk the wine of the passion of her sexual immorality, and the kings of the earth have committed immorality with her, and the merchants of the earth have grown rich from the power of her luxurious living.” Then I heard another voice from heaven saying, “Come out of her, my people, lest you take part in her sins, lest you share in her plagues; for her sins are heaped high as heaven, and God has remembered her iniquities. Pay her back as she herself has paid back others, and repay her double for her deeds; mix a double portion for her in the cup she mixed. As she glorified herself and lived in luxury, so give her a like measure of torment and mourning, since in her heart she says, ‘I sit as a queen, I am no widow, and mourning I shall never see.’ For this reason her plagues will come in a single day, death and mourning and famine, and she will be burned up with fire; for mighty is the Lord God who has judged her.” (Revelation 18:1-8, ESV)

In today’s passage, we continue to hear of the fall of “Babylon” — the city we have come to understand as Old Jerusalem. Some readers may wonder: why is Revelation spending so much time on this? Why would God inspire a whole section of Scripture to focus so intently on Jerusalem’s destruction?

The answer lies in understanding God’s covenant faithfulness. Throughout the Old Testament, God raised up prophets like Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel to proclaim judgment on Israel when they broke the covenant. Those books devote entire chapters to the consequences of covenant betrayal. Revelation follows in that same tradition, but now on a grander scale: the old covenant system itself was being “put away,” as Paul describes the casting out of the “slave woman” (Galatians 4:21-31).

The fall of Jerusalem in 70 AD was not just the end of a city; it was a cosmic event marking the close of the old era and the full unveiling of the new covenant in Christ. As Hebrews 12:25-26 reminds us, if those who ignored the warnings under the old covenant faced such devastating consequences, how much more should we revere the voice of Christ, the Son of God?

This passage serves both as a warning and an encouragement. God takes His covenants seriously. Yet for those who hear and obey, there is hope: we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken. The “shaking” of Jerusalem was necessary so that “the things that cannot be shaken” would remain. (Hebrews 12:27-29)

God’s covenant faithfulness demands a response. The fall of Jerusalem was not merely historical — it is a reminder that obedience matters. As everything temporary is shaken away, we are called to cling to Christ, whose kingdom is everlasting.

As we reflect on this, let us remember to take the message of Christ seriously, to stay faithful even when the world around us shakes, and to trust that God’s unshakable kingdom is our true home.