“Then I took the little scroll from the angel’s hand and ate it. It was as sweet as honey in my mouth, but when I ate it, my stomach became bitter. And they said to me, ‘You must prophesy again about many peoples, nations, languages, and kings.’” (vv. 10-11)

Think about the “little scroll”—given to the prophet, by the angel, with an instruction to eat it.

He is told that it will be sweet in his mouth. And it is!

Then he is told…that it won’t sit well. That it will make his stomach bitter. And it does!

It’s an odd moment, made clear by the angel’s concluding remark: he tells the revelator that he must yet prophesy to peoples and nations and kings.

You see, the truth of Revelation—of God’s judgment, of Christ’s return, and of the end of this earth—is actually sweet to the believer. We are comforted by the Lamb’s mercies. We are relieved by the realization that what has been promised is, in fact, so. We are captivated by the picture of rescue, of rapture, and of heaven. It’s sweet.

But, in the days before the final trumpet sounds, it doesn’t always sit well.

Christ’s people are called to be witnesses—but they won’t always be welcomed. We’ll be reviled, persecuted, even attacked. We will hope higher for our hearers than they might hope themselves. Our hearts will break when many choose darkness over the Light.

I look at the world, at those who might miss Jesus all the way to the end, and I feel that, right in my middle. What is sweet to me doesn’t always sit well.

— Tyler