What is Armageddon?
Armageddon is a catastrophic war campaign at the very end of the tribulation period (see Daniel 11:40-45; Joel 3:9-17; Zechariah 14:1-3; Revelation 16:14-16). “Armageddon” literally means “Mount of Megiddo” and refers to a location about 60 miles north of Jerusalem. This is the location of Barak’s battle with the Canaanites (Judges 4) and Gideon’s battle with the Midianites (Judges 7). This will be the site for the final horrific battles of humankind just prior to the second coming of Jesus Christ (Revelation 16:16).
Napoleon is reported to have once said that this site is perhaps the greatest battlefield he had ever seen. Of course, the battles Napoleon fought will dim in comparison to Armageddon. So horrible will Armageddon be that no one would survive if it were not for Christ coming again (Matthew 24:22).
Armageddon will involve an extended, escalating conflict, and it will be catastrophic. There are eight key phases of Armageddon.
What is phase 1 of Armageddon?
Phase 1 involves the allied armies of the antichrist gathering for the final destruction of the Jews. We find this assembling described in Revelation 16:12-16. Demonic spirits are depicted as going “abroad to the kings of the whole world, to assemble them for battle on the great day of God the Almighty…and they assembled them at the place that in Hebrew is called Armageddon.” The assembling of these armies actually takes place at the unleashing of the sixth bowl judgment. The Euphrates River will be dried up, thereby making it easier for the armies of the east to assemble.
Contextually, the goal of the massive coalition will be to once and for all destroy the Jewish people. Each member of the satanic trinity will be involved—Satan, the antichrist, and the false prophet. Demons, too, will be involved in summoning the kings of the earth.
What is phase 2 of Armageddon?
Revelation 17–18 reveals that there will be a revived Babylon in the end times, rebuilt by the antichrist. It will be a worldwide economic and religious center. It is noteworthy that when the late Saddam Hussein was in power in Iraq, he spent over 1 billion dollars in oil money to enhance present-day Babylon, which is some 50 miles south of Baghdad—essentially as a monument to himself.
At some point in the latter half of the tribulation period—we are not told precisely when—the antichrist will shift his headquarters to Babylon, which will become a global commercial center. Babylon at this time will likely be in control of the oil fields and the money these fields generate in the Middle East. It is this Babylonian commercial center that is destroyed during phase 2 of Armageddon.
Jeremiah 50:13-14 affirms that because of God’s wrath, Babylon will become “an utter desolation; everyone who passes by Babylon shall be appalled, and hiss because of all her wounds. Set yourselves in array against Babylon all around, all you who bend the bow; shoot at her, spare no arrows, for she has sinned against the LORD.” Isaiah 13:19 informs us that Babylon’s destruction “will be like Sodom and Gomorrah when God overthrew them.”
What is phase 3 of Armageddon?
The destruction of the antichrist’s capital is not enough to distract him from his goal of destroying the Jewish people. Hence, instead of launching a counterattack against the northern military coalition that wiped out Babylon, the antichrist and his forces now move south to attack Jerusalem. This constitutes phrase 3 of Armageddon. We read about it in Zechariah 12:1-3:
Thus declares the LORD, who stretched out the heavens and founded the earth and formed the spirit of man within him: “Behold, I am about to make Jerusalem a cup of staggering to all the surrounding peoples. The siege of Jerusalem will also be against Judah. On that day I will make Jerusalem a heavy stone for all the peoples. All who lift it will surely hurt themselves. And all the nations of the earth will gather against it.”
Zechariah 14:1-2 adds: “I will gather all the nations against Jerusalem to battle, and the city shall be taken and the houses plundered and the women raped. Half of the city shall go out into exile, but the rest of the people shall not be cut off from the city.”
What is phase 4 of Armageddon?
Not all of the Jews are in Jerusalem when the antichrist and his forces attack. Recall that in the middle of the tribulation period, the antichrist will break his covenant with Israel and exalt himself as deity, even putting an image of himself in the Jewish temple. Christ, in His Olivet Discourse, warned of how quickly the Jews must flee for their lives (Matthew 24:16-31). Many of the Jews apparently flee to the deserts and mountains (see Matthew 24:16), perhaps in the area of Bozrah/Petra, about 80 miles south of Jerusalem.
This escape from Jerusalem is described in Revelation 12:6: “The woman [a metaphor for Israel] fled into the wilderness, where she has a place prepared by God, in which she is to be nourished for 1,260 days [or three and a half years].” Indeed, “the woman was given the two wings of the great eagle so that she might fly from the serpent into the wilderness, to the place where she is to be nourished for a time, and times, and half a time [which is three and a half years]” (verse 14).
It is this remnant of Jews that the antichrist now targets. The Jews sense impending doom as the forces of the antichrist gather in the rugged wilderness, poised to attack and annihilate them. They are helpless and, from an earthly perspective, utterly defenseless. This sets the stage for phase 5 of Armageddon.
What is phase 5 of Armageddon?
Israel is endangered and acutely aware that the forces of the antichrist have gathered to destroy all the Jews. However, Scripture reveals that their spiritual blindness is now removed and they call out to their Messiah, Jesus Christ. At this point, the remnant experiences national regeneration.
Hosea 6:1-3 indicates that the Jewish leaders will call for the people of the nation to repent—and their collective repentance will take two days:
Come, let us return to the LORD; for he has torn us, that he may heal us; he has struck us down, and he will bind us up. After two days he will revive us; on the third day he will raise us up, that we may live before him. Let us know; let us press on to know the LORD; his going out is sure as the dawn; he will come to us as the showers, as the spring rains that water the earth.
Just as it was the Jewish leaders who led the Jewish people to reject Jesus as their Messiah, so now the Jewish leaders urge repentance and instruct all to turn to Jesus as their Messiah. This the remnant will do, and they will be saved.
This is in keeping with Joel 2:28-29, which informs us that there will be a spiritual awakening of the Jewish remnant. It would seem that Armageddon will be the historical context in which Israel finally becomes converted (Zechariah 12:2–13:1). The restoration of Israel will include the confession of Israel’s national sin (Leviticus 26:40-42; Jeremiah 3:11-18; Hosea 5:15), following which Israel will be saved, thereby fulfilling Paul’s prophecy in Romans 11:25-27. In dire threat at Armageddon, Israel will plead for their newly found Messiah to return and deliver them—they will “mourn for him, as one mourns for an only child” (Zechariah 12:10; see also Matthew 23:37-39; Isaiah 53:1-9)—at which point their deliverance will surely come (see Romans 10:13-14). Israel’s leaders will have finally realized why the tribulation has fallen on them—perhaps due to the Holy Spirit’s enlightenment of their understanding of Scripture, or the testimony of the 144,000 Jewish evangelists, or perhaps the testimony of the two prophetic witnesses.
What is phase 6 of Armageddon?
Phase 6 involves the glorious return of Jesus Christ. The prayers of the Jewish remnant are answered! The divine Messiah returns to rescue His people from danger. The very same Jesus who ascended into heaven comes again at the second coming (Acts 1:9-11).
The second coming will be a universal experience in the sense that every human being on earth will witness the event. Revelation 1:7 says, “Behold, he is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see him, even those who pierced him; and all the tribes of the earth will wail on account of him.” And Jesus Himself said, “Then will appear in heaven the sign of the Son of Man, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory” (Matthew 24:30).
Old Testament prophetic Scripture reveals that Jesus returns first to the mountain wilderness of Bozrah, where the Jewish remnant is endangered (Isaiah 34:1-7; 63:1-6; Habakkuk 3:3; Micah 2:12-13). Their endangerment is quickly over!
What is phase 7 of Armageddon?
Phase 7 involves the final battle, which will be over in a jiffy. At His second coming, Jesus will confront the antichrist and his forces, and slay them with the word of His mouth. The description of the second coming in the book of Revelation makes it clear that the enemies of Christ suffer instant defeat:
Then I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse! The one sitting on it is called Faithful and True, and in righteousness he judges and makes war. His eyes are like a flame of fire, and on his head are many diadems, and he has a name written that no one knows but himself. He is clothed in a robe dipped in blood, and the name by which he is called is The Word of God. And the armies of heaven, arrayed in fine linen, white and pure, were following him on white horses. From his mouth comes a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations, and he will rule them with a rod of iron. He will tread the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God the Almighty. On his robe and on his thigh he has a name written, King of kings and Lord of lords (Revelation 19:11-16).
So, instant deliverance comes to the Jewish remnant. The antichrist and his forces are poised for attack against the remnant in the wilderness. The remnant has no chance of survival. The Jewish leaders urge the remnant to repent and turn to Jesus the Messiah, which they promptly do. It is then that the second coming of Christ occurs.
Christ defeats all who stand against Israel. The antichrist will be slain. Habakkuk 3:13 prophesies of Christ’s victory over the antichrist: “You went out for the salvation of your people, for the salvation of your anointed. You crushed the head of the house of the wicked, laying him bare from thigh to neck.” Likewise, in 2 Thessalonians 2:8 we read of the antichrist that “the Lord Jesus will kill [him] with the breath of his mouth and bring [him] to nothing by the appearance of his coming.”
The antichrist will be shown to be impotent and powerless in the face of the true Christ. All the forces of the antichrist will also be destroyed, from Bozrah all the way back to Jerusalem (Joel 3:12-13; Zechariah 14:12-15; Revelation 14:19-20).
Glorious!
What is phase 8 of Armageddon?
Phase 8 involves Christ victoriously ascending to the Mount of Olives. We read about this in Zechariah 14:3-4:
Then the LORD will go out and fight against those nations as when he fights on a day of battle. On that day his feet shall stand on the Mount of Olives that lies before Jerusalem on the east, and the Mount of Olives shall be split in two from east to west by a very wide valley, so that one half of the Mount shall move northward, and the other half southward.
When Christ ascends to the Mount of Olives, some cataclysmic events bring an end to the tribulation period. These include:
• An earthquake of globally staggering proportions (compare with Revelation 8:5 and 11:19). The whole earth will feel its effects. Mountains will be leveled. Islands will vanish. The topography of the earth will be drastically changed.
• Jerusalem will be split into three areas.
• The Mount of Olives will split into two parts, creating a valley.
• There will be a horrific hailstorm, and the sun and moon will be darkened (see Joel 3:14-16; Matthew 24:29).
As these horrific events subside, the tribulation period finally comes to a close.