Revelation: The Black Horse

Revelation: Justification by Faith

The Black Horse

The next horse that God sends is the black horse. So, a black horse is sent into the spiritual kingdom of Satan.

Revelation 6:5–6 (ESV):

When he opened the third seal, I heard the third living creature say, “Come!” And I looked, and behold, a black horse! And its rider had a pair of scales in his hand.
And I heard what seemed to be a voice in the midst of the four living creatures, saying, “A quart of wheat for a denarius, and three quarts of barley for a denarius, and do not harm the oil and wine!”

This portrays scarcity of the essential.
With one quart of wheat or three quarts of barley, a person can just survive for one day. A denarius was a day's wage.
So, there is just barely enough for basic bread, but there is scarcity—appropriately associated with the black horse.
However, the oil and wine are not harmed. Oil and wine are more like luxury goods—not necessary to survive.
One can survive without oil and wine, but living without simple bread becomes much harder.
Thus, Satan’s spiritual kingdom is struck with spiritual scarcity.
But what is spiritual wheat or barley, from which bread is made?

The Bible says:

Deuteronomy 8:3 (ESV):

And he humbled you and let you hunger and fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that he might make you know that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.

Amos 8:9–12 (ESV):

And on that day,” declares the Lord God,
“I will make the sun go down at noon
and darken the earth in broad daylight.
I will turn your feasts into mourning
and all your songs into lamentation;
I will bring sackcloth on every waist
and baldness on every head;
I will make it like the mourning for an only son
and the end of it like a bitter day.

Behold, the days are coming,” declares the Lord God,
“when I will send a famine on the land—
not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water,
but of hearing the words of the Lord.
They shall wander from sea to sea,
and from north to east;
they shall run to and fro, to seek the word of the Lord,
but they shall not find it.

So, there will be little of the Word of God to be found.
But then the question arises: how is this an attack on Satan’s kingdom? Why does God send this horse?

If we assume that the first two horses show how God sends His people, then we can also assume that this still involves God’s people being sent into the kingdom of Satan. But the problem now is that God’s people themselves bring scarcity.
This originates from Satan, but the resulting scarcity is also a judgment from God.

In the context of the verses above, Amos had just been sent to prophesy against the king. But they rejected the Word of God, and now this judgment is declared.
Elsewhere it says:

2 Thessalonians 2:11–12 (ESV):

Therefore God sends them a strong delusion, so that they may believe what is false,
in order that all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness.

They do not love the truth, they delight in unrighteousness, they have no faith—and so God sends a delusion.
But at the same time, this delusion is also a call to return to God.
This spiritual hunger will be felt, and then people may surrender to the Kingdom of God.
So, while Satan tries to remove the bread of life, God allows this spiritual scarcity as both judgment and invitation to seek Him.

In the New Testament, the idea of spiritual bread becomes even more specific. Jesus Himself is called the Bread of Life:

John 6:35 (ESV):

Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst."

But He applies this especially to the fact that He gives life, and also to His flesh:

John 6:53–54, 63 (ESV):

So Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you.
Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.
…
It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life."

The blood of Jesus is sometimes compared to wine, and thus may not be entirely applicable here since the wine remains untouched.
But in John 6, the focus is especially on the bread and its necessity for survival.
We live by the Word of God—but John sees Jesus as the Word of God.

This brings us to three important points we must address in relation to this:

  1. His Life that He gives us.

  2. His flesh—His human nature which He assumed.

  3. The effect of this incarnation (which means that He became human).

In the next blogs, we will go through these one by one.

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