“And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues.”
The Lord brought His servants together, dividing them into three companies. He told them to go into the wicked city Babylon and warn people about their sin and that they needed to repent and come out. He then sent each of the three companies to a different part of the city, commanding them to return to Him at nightfall.
When it was starting to grow dark, the first company returned to the Lord. It was a multitude much larger in number than the company that went in, and His servants were joyous. They reported that they'd met many people who seemed to be waiting for them. They had been desperate to leave Babylon, but didn't know the way. They were miserable due to the evil of the city and were persecuted by many of its citizens. Once they knew how to leave Babylon, many decided to stay and help pass along the good news to as many as they could.
The Lord's servants also reported that their company would have been even larger, but they lost some to martyrdom at the hands of the city dwellers. But those who were killed died full of faith and sure that they would live forever in Heaven with the Lord.
Then the second company returned. It wasn't as large as the first and they reported more difficulty in getting the people of Babylon to listen to them. Their words were mostly met with derision and scorn, if not outright hostility and violence. And their company, too, had suffered persecution and martyrdom.
By this time, it was night, and the third company was still nowhere to be seen. The Lord inquired of the returned when they had last seen them. Not since they first entered the city and went their separate ways, they replied. One spoke up and told Him that they'd gone to the area of Babylon that had a reputation for being the most godless and unrepentant of the entire evil city.
Night passed without the third company returning. At first light, the Lord told the rest of His servants that they were going back into Babylon, and this time He was going with them as it was time to judge the city.
First, they went to find the company that hadn't returned. They found them in the most evil part of the city, just where the Lord had sent them. They were living in pleasure, comfort and ungodliness when the Lord found them and demanded to know why they hadn't left the city and returned to Him as He'd commanded them.
Quickly, they tried to explain to the Lord their reasoning and what they were doing. They had seen that the people they were sent to warn were the worst sinners of all -- proud, unloving, lustful, greedy, worldly. They couldn't see any hope of these people ever repenting of their sin and fleeing Babylon no matter what anyone said or did. They were ungrateful to God, despite many of them possessing a great many earthly blessings. And they fiercely defended their lives and persecuted those who followed the Lord.
So the third company decided to live among them and try to do what they could to point them to the Lord. And in a way, there didn't seem to be all that much wrong with these people. Many of them were blessed, and they enjoyed these blessings. They just didn't credit God for them as they should. That was the problem. The third company actually thought that everyone could learn from how these Babylonians enjoyed the blessings given to them, unlike many dour and joyless Christians who seemed to love misery and suffering. And as along as the third company wasn't overbearing about talking about the Lord, these Babylonians would pretty much leave them alone to their beliefs.
So the third company decided that somehow, some way, they must have misunderstood the Lord's command to come out of Babylon at nightfall. Both day and night are gifts from God, they reasoned, and the Babylonians loved and celebrated the darkness. It was naturally appealing, too, to the servants of the third company. They were just enjoying all that God had given to human beings, both day and night. They happily joined the celebrations of the Babylonians, and the Babylonians were happy that they joined them rather than preaching at them or trying to talk to them about the Lord.
But to the surprise of the third company, the Lord rejected all their reasons for not leaving the city at nightfall. Did they think they knew better than He?
Rather than humbling themselves and admitting their disobedience, the servants of the third company grew angry at the Lord's rebuke. Didn't He send them to the worst sinners of Babylonians, the ones that He knew would never repent? He had given them an impossible mission, and yet He was finding fault with them!
That's so, the Lord answered them. He explained then that He had given them an impossible mission since He knew they were lazy servants whose hearts weren't truly with Him. They weren't His servants, after all. Why would He give them true work to do if they would never do it? He had sent them in to be with those they truly loved, the Babylonians whose king is Satan.
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