A Historic Celebration
“THE WAR of the great day of God the Almighty” at Armageddon will be the greatest in the history of our globe, and it will be the last. (Rev. 16:14, 16) As God’s prophet declared, for the comfort of those who love him: “Jehovah is good, a stronghold in the day of distress. . . . He is causing an outright extermination. Distress will not rise up a second time.”—Nah. 1:7-9.
What follows next? The apostle John tells us that he hears “a loud voice of a great crowd in heaven.” In grand chorus, this angelic host is singing: “Hallelujah! The salvation and the glory and the power belong to our God, because his judgments are true and righteous. For he has executed judgment upon the great harlot who corrupted the earth with her fornication, and he has avenged the blood of his slaves at her hand.” (Rev. 19:1, 2, “Kingdom Interlinear Translation”) What rejoicing! Because, for all time, the oppressions, the apostasy and the murderous ways of the world empire of false religion, “Babylon the Great,” have been swept off the face of God’s earth.
What else does the apostle hear? “And right away for the second time they said: ‘Hallelujah!’” Then a third “Hallelujah!” rings out, and appropriately John, who is elsewhere called ‘a Son of Thunder,’ adds the climactic words: “I heard what was as a voice of a great crowd and as a sound of many waters and as a sound of heavy thunders. They said: ‘Hallelujah, because Jehovah our God, the Almighty, has begun to rule as king.’”—Rev. 19:3-6, “Int.”; Mark 3:17.
The singing of those heavenly voices is far grander than any “Hallelujah chorus” ever heard on this earth. The myriads of angels know what that song is all about. So they sing it with delightful feeling and expression: “Hallelujah!”—meaning “Praise Jah, you people!” God’s people on earth come out of the “great tribulation” to share in that song, praising Jah, Jehovah, the Sovereign Lord of all the universe, for his great victory over all the forces of wickedness.
Other glorious events follow. Jehovah’s people are invited to “rejoice and be overjoyed,” because now a marriage takes place in heaven. The Lamb is united with his “wife”—the full number of 144,000 resurrected “holy ones,” who have been identified by the “righteous acts” that they performed while humans on earth. (Rev. 19:6-8; 14:1-5) The governmental arrangement of the “new heavens” is now complete. Already, before the “great tribulation,” the Lamb had been shepherding a “great crowd” of human worshipers. (Rev. 7:9, 14) But now the promise that God “will wipe out every tear from their eyes” is to be fulfilled toward all mankind, including the resurrected dead, as a “new earth” society begins to operate among humans.—Rev. 21:1, 4; 2 Pet. 3:13.
God’s loyal ones in heaven and on earth will be united in that grandest, that most meaningful singing of the Hallelujah chorus. For Jah, Jehovah, will have gained the victory!