1. The expression “the harvest of the earth is ripe” (14:15b) indicates that God's judgment is overdue. The verb form “is ripe” means “to become dry or withered.”
2. The picture here is of a fruit or vegetable that has become so ripe that it has begun to dry up and wither.
3. God is going to deal with the rotten moral condition of this wicked, sin-loving world.
4. The poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow said, "Though the mills of God grind slowly, Yet they grind exceeding small; Though with patience he stands waiting, With exactness grinds he all."
5. I could give many examples of the rotten moral condition of the world today, but I do not think that would be necessary -- abortion, homosexuality, adultery, pornography, sex-change operations, etc.
6. Recently a judge in Australia (Garry Neilson, from the district court in New South Wales) said incest should no longer be prohibited, and that society should now accept consensual sex between adult siblings.
7. Bestiality is now becoming more accepted.
8. "The harvest of the earth is ripe” (14:15b) means God's judgment is overdue (cf. Genesis 6:11-13).
9. Our Lord said, "And as it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be also in the days of the Son of man" (Luke 17:26).
10. In Revelation 14:14, the apostle John beholds the Lord sitting on a white cloud wearing a golden crown and having in his hand a sharp sickle.
11. In addition to the sharp sickle (14:14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19); we also see a ripe harvest (14:15, 18); and a great winepress (14:19, 20).

I. A SHARP SICKLE

1. A sickle is a hooked instrument with sharp teeth; used for cutting grain. In Scripture it is often pictured as an instrument of judgment.
2. Joel 3:13 says, "Put ye in the sickle, for the harvest is ripe: come, get you down; for the press is full, the fats overflow; for their wickedness is great."
3. In Revelation 14:14-20, we see the word "sickle" seven times. The number seven is prominent in the book of Revelation, and represents God's perfect and complete judgment.
4. We are told the man holding the sharp sickle in Revelation 14:14 is "the Son of man, having on his head a golden crown."
5. Furthermore, Revelation 14:17 refers to a second sharp sickle. This is a prophecy of the future battle of Armageddon (cf. Rev. 16:13-16).
6. We are getting very close to the fulfillment of these ancient prophecies. Zechariah 12:2 says, "Behold, I will make Jerusalem a cup of trembling unto all the people round about, when they shall be in the siege both against Judah and against Jerusalem."
7. They are under siege right now, and it will get worse. Hezbollah, a Muslim terrorist group, is firing rockets into Israel from Lebanon.
8. As Muslim terrorists in the Gaza Strip continue to fire rockets toward Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, Israel is striking back in an attempt to crush Hamas, the Muslim terror group that controls the Gaza Strip.
9. The terrorist group ISIS, the Muslim jihadists chopping off heads all over Iraq, have grabbed 88 pounds of uranium compounds from a Mosul University science lab, and there is the possibility that these deadly toxins could be used to make a so-called "dirty bomb."
10. Dirty bombs could even be carried across our border in Texas, where Muslims are sneaking in with the surge of people from Latin America.
11. The Turkish government recently cut off the flow of the Euphrates River, threatening primarily Syria but also Iraq with a major water crisis (cf. Rev. 16:12; 9:14-16).
12. Red China alone claims to have a man-and-woman militia of 200,000,000, exactly the figure of Revelation 9:16. "The kings of the east" (16:12) could also include North Korea and other allies.
13. "For the harvest of the earth is ripe" (Rev. 14:15).

II. A RIPE HARVEST

1. The picture of the harvest is used throughout the Bible to symbolize the final gathering and separation of that which is good (wheat) from that which is bad (chaff). We see this often in the Old Testament.
2. Job said, "How oft is the candle of the wicked put out! and how oft cometh their destruction upon them! God distributeth sorrows in his anger. They are as stubble before the wind, and as chaff that the storm carrieth away" (Job 21:17, 18).
3. Psalm 1:4 and 6 says "the ungodly are...like the chaff which the wind driveth away," and "the way of the ungodly shall perish."
4. This picture of the final harvest is also found often in the New Testament. Our Lord said in Matthew 13:39, "The enemy that sowed them is the devil; the harvest is the end of the world; and the reapers are the angels" (cf. Matthew 13:18-30).
5. The Bible teaches there are two aspects to this final harvest -- a harvest of redemption and a harvest of judgment -- the Lord gathering, and the Lord reaping.
6. That is what John the Baptist meant when he said the Lord "will throughly purge his floor, and will gather the wheat into his garner; but the chaff he will burn with fire unquenchable" (Luke 3:17).
7. The good wheat will be gathered first, but the wicked chaff will be burned with "fire unquenchable."
8. It is unfortunate that many lost sinners have been deceived into thinking hell is not real. But John the Baptist described it as "fire unquenchable."
9. And the Lord Himself referred to hell repeatedly as a furnace of fire where there will be weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth (cf. Mark 9:43-48).
10. There are two aspects to this final harvest -- a harvest of redemption and a harvest of judgment. Our Lord referred to the harvest of redemption in Matthew 9:37 and 38, when He said to his disciples, "The harvest truly is plenteous, but the labourers are few; Pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he will send forth labourers into his harvest."
11. Our Lord referred to the harvest of redemption in Mark 4:29, "But when the fruit is brought forth, immediately he putteth in the sickle, because the harvest is come."
12. Our Lord referred to the harvest of redemption in John 4:35, "Say not ye, There are yet four months, and then cometh harvest? behold, I say unto you, Lift up your eyes, and look on the fields; for they are white already to harvest."

III. A GREAT WINEPRESS

1. Billy Graham started out as a strong Bible preacher but unfortunately he compromised as he got older and more popular. But nevertheless I agree with these remarks he made a couple of years ago: "Why is there such an increase of trouble for America? Could it be that our sins are beginning to catch up with us? Today America is following the same dangerous path. We worship the gods of secularism and materialism. God is displeased, and I warn you that His anger is being kindled. If ever a nation has enjoyed prosperity and the blessing of God, it is America; but instead of giving thanks to God, we have offered our reverence and worship to created things. As Paul wrote in Romans 1:25, 'Who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen.' And Romans 1:22, 'Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools.' The Bible says there will come a day when a nation sins so much against God that God will give them up, and will allow them to go on for a time in pleasure, worldliness, idolatry, wickedness and immorality. The Scripture says that there is pleasure in sin for a season (Hebrews 11:25), but warns that the pleasure will be extremely short-lived and that judgment will follow" (Decision).
2. In Revelation 14:19 the angel, thrusts his sickle into the earth and casts it into “the great winepress of the wrath of God” (cf. 19:15).
3. Twice the sharp sickle is mentioned in verse 18, and the clusters of the vine of the earth are described as grapes fully ripe -- that is, ripe for judgment!
4. This is a vivid picture of divine judgment as God's harvest. This is a picture of grapes fully grown and almost bursting with juice (cf. Isaiah 63:1-6).
5. How foolish to sin with impunity or to procrastinate or to backslide when the Lord will soon return with His sharp sickle!

CONCLUSION:

1. I read an interesting story about a pastor in southern England. He had hanging in his study a very beautiful picture of a shipwreck, and in the shipwreck there was one life being saved.
2. A visitor was greatly moved by the interesting picture and asked him about it, and the preacher told him the story behind it.
3. One day a very wealthy man called on this pastor, and said that he would like to talk to him about a place where his body might be buried in the church graveyard.
4. They went out and they walked through the church graveyard, and they inspected several place in the graveyard where his body might be placed, and finally the wealthy gentleman selected the spot in which he wished to be buried.