And I saw another strong angel coming down out of the heaven, clothed with a cloud, and the rainbow upon his head, and his countenance as the sun, and his feet as pillars of fire,
Revelation 10 breaks into the series of trumpet judgments like light through storm clouds. The first question every reader asks is who this "mighty angel" is, and the details of his appearance answer it.
This chapter pauses the trumpet judgments. The vision comes at the darkest moment.
Things are drawing to a close. The half-week of sorrow (three and a half years) is nearly over. Its last hours show the world in mad, open rebellion against God. They also show His saints, on whom the Beast and the Antichrist pour out their fury. But before the Gentile and Jewish apostates and those they have fooled drink the last dregs of the Lord's vengeance, this comforting vision breaks through the dark clouds of judgment. It is a stern reminder to the world. Despite the rage of the wicked, the government of the earth is the Creator's just claim, and He is about to make that claim good in power. The vision is also well fitted to strengthen and comfort believers, especially suffering saints. The same power that will crush the enemy lifts the sufferers to honour.
The description itself gives the answer.
This is the personal description of this mighty angel. Several of its details point us to the Lord Jesus Christ Himself. He is clothed with a cloud. A cloud is often connected with the divine presence, and so with our Lord... On the mount of transfiguration a cloud overshadowed both Him and His disciples (Matt. 17; Luke 9); and when He ascended up into heaven a cloud received Him out of the sight of His own (Acts 1)... In Revelation 4 the rainbow is around the divine throne; here it is on the angel's head. The rainbow is the symbol of God's everlasting covenant with the earth (Genesis 9:12-13). None, therefore, but a Divine Person could wear the rainbow on His head. The last two features, the face like the sun and the feet like pillars of fire, are almost exactly the same as those given in Revelation 1:15-16. There can be no doubt, then, that this mighty angel is Christ.
An earlier chapter also spoke of a "strong angel." The shared word can mislead.
"Another strong angel" takes our thoughts back to Revelation 5:2. The only thing the two have in common is the word "strong." The earlier text speaks of a created being given great might. This passage shows us an uncreated Being of divine majesty and power. It is the Lord Himself. We have had already a vision of the Lord in angelic, priestly intercession (Rev. 8:3); here He asserts in angelic power His undisputed claim to the dominion of the earth.
Each feature says something about the One who wears it and about what He comes to do. Older translations read "feet" where the ESV has "legs."
A mighty angel comes down out of heaven, the source of His action. He is clothed with a cloud, the special sign of Jehovah's majesty (Isa. 19:1). None but He has the right to come clothed like that. Further, the rainbow is on His head. He occupies Himself with divine mercy toward the creation. It is no longer a matter of the rainbow around the throne. Here a further step is taken. He approaches the earth. He asserts His undeniable claim to all creation, because it is His by right. "And His face was as the sun," with supreme authority; "and His feet as pillars of fire," with firmness of divine judgment.
If this is Christ, why does John see Him in an angel's form at all? The answer lies in the timing.
The tenth chapter clearly shows that Christ is soon to assert His own rights in the earth. He will declare that He is the only Potentate, the King of kings and Lord of lords... John saw a mighty angel standing for Christ in this way because the time for Christ's actual return had not yet come. The vision surely tells us this: however hardened, unbelieving and unrepentant men may be, Christ is Lord of all. He is soon to lay claim to all, and so events will move fast.
Of all the emblems, the rainbow is the strangest to find on a figure who comes to judge.
The strong angel's descent to earth signals the close of God's providential dealings. The scene of action is now openly on earth, not in heaven... The rainbow on his head is the same rainbow John saw before (Rev. 4:3). There it encircled the throne and its majestic Occupant; here it rests on the head of the angel, with all its many colours and glories. In the middle of these scenes of judgment God's remembrance of mercy is constant and unfailing. The bow in the cloud, that ancient token of divine goodness (Gen. 9), reappears here, just at the time and season when it is most needed.
- Timing — The vision breaks in at the darkest hour: comfort for suffering saints, warning for a rebellious world.
- Identity — Cloud, rainbow, face like the sun, legs like pillars of fire: marks of a Divine Person. Commentators agree the angel is Christ.
- Contrast — The "strong angel" of chapter 5 is a created being. This One is uncreated. They share only the word "strong."
- Meaning — Cloud: Jehovah's majesty. Rainbow: mercy toward creation. Face: supreme authority. Feet: firm judgment.
- Mercy — The rainbow rests on the head of the Judge. God remembers His goodness at the very moment He claims the earth in power.
and having in his hand a little opened book. And he set his right foot on the sea, and the left upon the earth,
A mighty figure comes down from heaven, holding an open scroll, one foot on the sea and one on the land. Before He says a word, His stance already stakes a claim — and the verse leaves us asking who He is, and what He claims.
The description just before this verse tells us whose hand holds the book.
From Revelation 10 to 11:14 is a parenthesis. It begins with a Mighty Angel, clothed with a cloud, a rainbow on His head, His face like the sun, and His feet like pillars of fire. In this description there can be no mistake. Here we have the Lord Himself in angelic form. When He appears it is indeed the beginning of the end.
Earlier He appeared as a priest. Here that has changed.
So we have again the Lord in angelic appearance. Before, He appeared as high priest; here He is the angel with royal claim… He approaches the earth, and He asserts His undeniable claim to all creation as His by right… It is no sealed-up book now, but a little one and open: sea or earth are alike His.
Five chapters earlier a scroll appeared that no one could open until the Lamb broke its seals. This one is open, and it is small.
In Revelation 5 the Lord holds a closed, seven-sealed book in His right hand. Here the angel holds an open book. Why closed in the one and open in the other? In the first, the Lamb discloses the purposes of God one by one, purposes never revealed before. In the second, "the book is open as part of well-known prophecy, and now brought to a direct issue on known ground." This is also a "little" book, small compared with the larger book of chapter 5, which was so full that it was written on both sides.
Nothing here is sealed. Its contents already stood written in older prophecy.
It is not a sealed book like the one in Revelation 5, whose contents no one could know until the seals were broken. This book is open, and its contents were already known. Christ's action in taking possession of the earth and the sea — and all that earth and sea represent — is pictured by His right foot on the sea and His left foot on the earth. The prophetic writings had surely made this known already. (See, for example, Psalm 72; Isaiah 11; 25; 60; Zechariah 14, and countless other passages.)
The two feet cover two different sorts of humanity.
The angel set His right foot on the sea, and His left foot on the earth. In Scripture the sea often pictures the mass of nations in an uncivilised state. The earth speaks of the ordered part of the world that has had the light of God, whether in Judaism or Christendom. So the earth is the part of the world that prophecy applies to above all. This leads us on to the time when Christ will publicly assert His rights over the whole world.
Which foot goes where is not accidental.
Three times in this vision the angel stands on the sea and the earth, and each time the sea is named before the earth, while elsewhere in this book the order is reversed. Is it chance or divine precision that the right foot comes down on the rebellious nations and peoples, and the left on the professed scene of light and government? How firm the tread of the angel! How complete the action! How thorough the subjugation of all to Him!
The stance is one of ownership, but the world does not yet see it.
The Angel stood with His right foot on the sea and His left on the earth. That is, He dominates the whole world — both the unstable, turbulent masses and the more stable, organized kingdoms. So He dominates the entire scene, though for a short time yet He does not display His supremacy, and men do not acknowledge it.
Later in the chapter John is told to eat this same open book. That instruction teaches anyone who handles God's word.
Notice the thought underneath: what the servant of God gives out as prophecy or teaching, he must first eat, digest and absorb himself. Nothing does more spiritual harm than to proclaim and parade our knowledge of truth that we have not yet really made our own in meditation, in prayer, in experience. Gaining fresh truth is sweet and thrilling as honey. But once we digest and absorb it inside, it always displaces flesh and self and the world, and that is a bitter process.
- Owner — the figure holding the book is the Lord Himself in angelic form. He no longer acts as priest; He comes down with royal claim to all creation.
- Open — this book needs no unsealing, unlike the sealed scroll of Revelation 5. Its contents are prophecy already written, now brought to a head.
- Reach — the right foot covers the sea: the turbulent, unformed nations. The left covers the earth: the ordered world that has had God's light. Nothing lies outside the two feet.
- Firmness — the two feet planted on sea and land picture complete subjugation. For now, men neither see nor admit His supremacy.
- Digestion — the servant must eat the same open book before he preaches it. Fresh truth tastes sweet as honey, but absorbed truth displaces self, and that is bitter.
and cried with a loud voice as a lion roars. And when he cried, the seven thunders uttered their own voices.
A mighty angel stands with one foot on the sea and one on the land. He shouts like a roaring lion, and seven thunders answer. Who is calling out? Why does the cry sound like a lion? And what do the thunders say?
Commentators identify this cry as the voice of Christ. They hear in it a note struck earlier in the book, where He appears as both Lion and Lamb.
Along with the act of the angel we have His voice of majesty and power, causing intense terror throughout the whole earth (Hosea 11:10; Joel 3:16). It is the voice of Christ. "He sends out His voice, His mighty voice" (Ps. 68:33). We have here the roar of the lion of the tribe of Judah. Chapter 5 names Him this way alongside the Lamb, in that magnificent heavenly scene. But there we see the Lamb acting; here the Lion.
One commentator reads the image through the prophet Amos, where a lion roars only when it already has prey.
"Does a lion roar in the forest, when he has no prey? Does a young lion cry out from his den, if he has taken nothing? … For the Lord God does nothing without revealing His secret to His servants the prophets. The lion has roared; who will not fear? The Lord God has spoken; who can but prophesy?" (Amos 3.) I cannot help seeing this passage from the prophet as an illustration, in several ways, of the vision before us. Again, in the Old Testament thunder always stood for God's authority in judgment. We are called to hear this dreadful announcement of God's judgments.
The thunders are described as uttering "their own voices," and that wording is pressed: this is speech, not noise.
The angel's cry was a cry to Jehovah, and it is answered at once. The answer is one of power and judgment. Thunder is God's voice in judgment, the expression of His authority in it (1 Sam. 7:10; Ps. 18:13; Job 26:14). "The seven thunders" indicate a full and perfect response to the angel's cry. "The seven" gives precision and definiteness to the answering voices of the thunders. This was not a crash like natural thunder. These thunders gave clear expression to the mind of the God of judgment; they "uttered their own voices."
Another writer places the roar just before the blow falls.
It is the voice that comes first, the voice of Judah's Lion, as "suddenly His anger kindles." The seven thunders answer it — the full divine voice, the whole government of God in action. But what they say must find its meaning at a later time.
John hears the thunders, but a voice from heaven stops his pen.
His voice, too, was of the highest power and majesty. Its echo was the seven thunders, which surely speak of further acts of judgment. God makes the seals, the trumpets and the bowls all public, but by express command the thunders go unrecorded. It is a solemn thought. Many details of the divine judgments are revealed, yet there will be judgments beyond anything made known to us.
Commentators differ on the reason. Some say the meaning waits for a later time. Another writer draws a practical lesson from the ban itself.
The thunders spoke clearly, but John is not allowed to write their words (v. 4). So we do not need to know what was said.
This vision arrives at the darkest point of the story. It speaks to more than the guilty.
Things are drawing to a close. The three and a half years of sorrow are nearly spent, but their last hours show the world in mad and open rebellion against God, and against His saints, on whom the Beast and the Antichrist unleash their fury. Before the Gentile and Jewish apostates and those they have fooled drink the last of the Lord's vengeance, this comforting vision breaks through the dark clouds of judgment. It is a stern reminder to the world that, despite the raging of the wicked, the government of the earth is the just claim of the Creator. He is about to make that claim good in power. But the vision is also perfectly fitted to strengthen and comfort believers, and especially suffering saints. The same power that will crush the enemy raises the sufferers to honour.
- Lion. The one who cries is Christ — the Lamb of chapter 5 now acting as the Lion of Judah, claiming the earth as His own.
- Roar. A lion roars when the prey is already taken. The cry announces judgment that is settled, not threatened.
- Thunder. Seven thunders answer the roar. This is the full, exact voice of God's authority — words with meaning, not noise.
- Sealed. John understood the words, but heaven told him not to write them. God keeps judgments in reserve beyond all He has revealed.
- Comfort. The same power that crushes the rebel lifts the suffering believer. This vision breaks like light through the darkest hour.