The Four Horsemen-The White Horse

“And I saw when the Lamb opened one of the seals, and I heard, as it were the noise of thunder, one of the four beasts saying, Come and see.  And I saw, and behold a white horse: and he that sat on him had a bow; and a crown was given to him: and he went forth conquering and to conquer.”  Revelation 6:1-2

There is a lot being said today about the possibility of this particular time of turmoil and fear being part of the end times.  I have no idea that what we are experiencing now with the COVID-19, the riots, and the move toward socialism is indicative of the actual tribulation period, but anyone who has studied the books of Revelation, Daniel, and Matthew, among others, can discern that there is something going on that we have not experienced before to this degree.  The book of Revelation tells us about the four horsemen of the apocalypse, with apocalypse meaning “a revealing”.  The events of the tribulation will be revealed when Christ breaks the seven seals of the book which God gives to Him.  When the first seal is opened, as the Apostle John recorded, the first thing that he sees is a white horse.

There are some Bible commentators, particularly those who lived hundreds of years ago, who believed that the opening of these seals has already taken place.  They believed that certain events in history, particularly those leading up to and during the Roman Empire, were the fulfillment of the prophecy of Revelation.  However, John wrote the book of Revelation some 25 years after the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans, thus it doesn’t seem expedient to suppose that this historical event would be part of a future prophecy.  If most of this prophecy was written about past events, there is little left to reveal future events leading up to the second coming of Christ.  We also can see that many of past worldly events are symbolic of future events.  In Daniel 11:21, he writes of Antiochus Epiphanes, who was one of the generals of Alexander the Great.  Antiochus is known as the antichrist of the Old Testament because he was a tyrant who killed Jews for any reason.  He foreshadows the antichrist of the New Testament which is yet to appear.

When the first seal is broken, John sees a white horse and one who sat on him, who carried a bow and had received a crown.  His mission was to conquer as he went forth.  Again, commentators of scripture differ on their ideas of who it is who rides the white horse.  Some are convinced that it is Christ.  They consider the bow that has no accompanying arrows as representative of the gospel which conquers the hearts of men and the crown as representing the King of glory.  In Revelation 19:11, Jesus does ride a white horse, but He will not return until the end of the seven year tribulation period, known as the 70th week in Daniel’s prophecy (Daniel 9:24-27) and not at the beginning of the tribulation.  The opposing view held by other scholars is that this rider is a future world ruler, whom we call the antichrist, who will come on the scene at the beginning of the seven years bringing in a false peace through a bloodless coup for the first half of the seven years.  Just before his appearance, the world will be in such turmoil and upheaval that most of its inhabitants will fall as easy prey into the hands of this false messiah.

We might wonder why the antichrist would also ride a white horse.  We think of white as being a symbol of purity, and the antichrist is about as far from purity as anyone could be.  The while horse also is symbolic of a conqueror, thus the antichrist will be allowed to conquer much of the world, but only for a short time.  We know that the devil is called “the prince of the power of the air” (Ephesians 2:2), and he has been doing his dirty work on earth for quite some time working through his demons and working through people who have ignored the gospel of Christ. The good news is that his days are numbered, but until the time that he is cast into the lake of fire permanently (Revelation 20:10), he will reign havoc upon the people of earth as is very evident in these troublesome times.  The title of “antichrist” means one who is against Christ, but it also means one who attempts to take the place of Christ.  Thus, like Christ, he will also ride a white horse.  His objective is to steal the worship and adoration that belongs only to Christ, and his mentor and benefactor, Satan, has been at this endeavor since time began.  Remember what happened in the garden of Eden?  His only mission is to “kill, steal, and destroy” (John 10:10).

As to the identity of the antichrist, many have tried to speculate who he might be, but that should not be the aim of those who study the book of Revelation.  We know that the spirit of antichrist is here and has been with us for a long time.  One of the important messages that Jesus gave to John to give to us is that those who read, study, and remember the prophecies of the book of Revelation are blessed, and that “the time is at hand” (Revelation 1:3).  Jesus also said in Matthew 24:42-44, to “Watch therefore: for ye know not what hour your Lord doth come.  But know this, that if the goodman of the house had known in what watch the thief would come, he would have watched and would not have suffered his house to be broken up.  Therefore be ye also ready: for in such an hour as ye think not the Son of man cometh.”

Next time we will look at the red horse.