The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse

Popular culture has widely appropriated ideas of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. It was the nickname of the Notre Dame football team’s backfield in 1924. Rock band Metallica used it as the title for a song. The Four Horsemen made a brief appearance in the movie Hellboy: The Fury and appear in more than one Marvel comic story line. They were even featured in an episode of The Simpsons. All this may blunt the force of our encounter with them in Revelation 6.

The Four Horsemen issue forth from the first four of the seven seals on the scroll mentioned in chapter 5. Each horseman represents a mode of divine judgment, which is progressive. The horseman who conquers is followed by the horseman who takes peace from the earth (v. 4). He gives way to a black horse with scales in his hands who brings want (vv. 5–6). The fourth horseman is the most terrifying: “I looked, and there before me was a pale horse! Its rider was named Death, and Hades was following close behind him. They were given power over a fourth of the earth to kill by sword, famine and plague, and by the wild beasts of the earth” (v. 8). And this is only the overture. Three more seals will follow and from the seventh seal will come another series of seven judgments.

We must remember that the Four Horsemen are not merely a cultural trope. They point to real events that will take place at the end of the age. These events are not random disasters. Only the Lamb can break the seals and set them in motion. They are an execution of divine judgment that will eventually culminate in God’s ultimate victory.

Pray with Us

It’s Commencement on Moody’s Chicago campus today! We invite you to pray for Moody’s graduate and undergraduate students as they receive their degrees. Let us thank the Lord for His work in their lives and send them off with a blessing.

BY Dr. John Koessler

John Koessler is Professor Emeritus of Applied Theology and Church Ministries at Moody Bible Institute. John authors the “Practical Theology” column for Today in the Word of which he is also a contributing writer and theological editor. An award-winning author, John’s newest title is When God is Silent: Let the Bible Teach You to Pray (Kirkdale). Prior to joining the Moody faculty, he served as a pastor of Valley Chapel in Green Valley, Illinois, for nine years. He and his wife, Jane, now enjoy living in a lakeside town in Michigan.