(2) The three angels of judgment--14:6-12.
1. And I saw another angel fly in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people--14:6.
This angel of proclamation symbolized the evangelism of the world with the gospel, and was paralleled with the angels of Mat 24:31, who were to be sent “ to gather his elect from the four winds of the earth,” after the destruction of Jerusalem. The message of the everlasting gospel of this Revelation angel was the same gospel of the kingdom of Mat 24:14; Matthew 24:31 -which was preached by the angels who gathered the elect from one end of heaven to the other, after the destruction of Jerusalem.
These angels of Revelation, as of Matthew twenty-four, symbolized gospel emissaries, and both passages (Matthew 24:31 and Revelation 14:6) referred to the universal expansion of Christianity which followed the downfall of Judaism. The end mentioned in Matthew 24:14 --"and then shall the end come” --undoubtedly had reference to the end of the Jewish state and the termination of the period of the persecution by the rulers of Rome and Judea.
The visions of Revelation are again seen to be an extension of the Lord’ s abbreviated account of the same events in Matthew the twenty-fourth chapter, both of which were the delineations of the war against the Jews, the siege and destruction of Jerusalem, and of the terrible tribulation which the churches sustained and survived.
The evangelistic angel of verse 6 had the everlasting gospel to preach . . . to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people, while the angels of Mat 24:31 were sent to gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other. The events were the same, the angels were the same, their evangelistic mission and gospel message were the same, the symbolism was the same and the period the visions covered was the same--the time of trial and tribulation of the churches during the war against Jerusalem, with all of the events connected with its downfall and the subsequent persecution of the church.
The apocalyptist here envisions the immediate postpersecution unrestrained proclamation of the gospel. The angelic evangel was seen flying “ in the midst of heaven” --that is, in the domain of the civil governments and political authorities that had waged the persecution against the church. But the persecutors were seen as having been defeated and the period of persecution as having ended, and the angel emissary was seen heralding the everlasting gospel to the people of the whole Roman world. It was the gospel which imperial power could not destroy, which had survived bloodshed and martyrdom--the everlasting and universal gospel then to be preached “ unto them that dwell on the earth” (Judea and Palestine), where the saints had been killed, and “ to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people” (the whole region of the persecuting powers). It iss the same universal, indestructible, everlasting gospel today.