The Second Woe Harvest of Wicked People (Revelation 14:17-20)

Christ Reaps Mortal Sons of Perdition (Rev 14:17-18)

John describes the Second Woe Harvest of righteous and wicked people in Revelation 14:14-20. Christ first reaps all exaltation-worthy saints and gathers them to stand with him on mount Zion as part of the 144,000 Servants identified in Revelation 14:1-2. This reaping of the righteous coincides with the morning of the first resurrection that will resume when the Two Witnesses are resurrected in Jerusalem as recorded in Revelation 11:7-12. Once the reaping of the righteous is complete, the wicked harvest follows. "Evil has its harvest as well as good. There is a harvest of misery and woe,–a harvest for the gathering, binding, and burning of the tares–as well as for the gathering of the wheat into the garner of heaven." (Seiss, Joseph A., The Apocalypse, Lectures on the Book of Revelation, 359)

The harvest of wicked people occurs as Christ (the third angel in Revelation 14:17) symbolically comes out of the temple in heaven with a sharp sickle. He is told by God the Father (the fourth angel in Revelation 14:18) to thrust in his sickle and "gather the clusters of the vine of the earth; for her grapes are fully ripe." The fully ripe "grapes" are mortal sons of perdition who are so fully ripe in sin that they cannot be forgiven.

God the Father comes out of the brazen altar of the temple with power over fire to direct Christ. The brazen altar of sacrifice is where sin offerings were made for the forgiveness and redemption of sin in the ancient temples at Jerusalem. The fire on that altar was never allowed to burn out because it represented the eternal covenant between Jehovah and his people. However, when the Father symbolically comes out from that altar with its fire, the fire of the altar is symbolically extinguished. The fire that once saved is gone, which means there can be no forgiveness for the sons of perdition who will be destroyed during the Second Woe Harvest.

Christ Treads the Winepress (Rev 14:19-20)

When Christ reaps all mortal sons of perdition like overripe clusters of the vine, he will symbolically cast them "into the great winepress of the wrath of God. And the winepress was trodden without the city." (Rev 14:20) Christ alone will tread the winepress outside the walls of Jerusalem, where his blood was shed when he was crucified in the same location. This is when Christ's raiment will symbolically become red as it is stained with the blood of the persons he treads in the winepress of God's wrath. (See also, Isa 63:1-3; D&C 133:46-48)

This will be a massive slaughter of the wicked based on the hyperbolic symbols used by John to describe the destruction. He states that the blood of the wicked will symbolically flow to a depth of 4 to 5 feet for the space of 1600 furlongs (about 160 miles). The number 1600 is derived from the world number four squared (4x4), multiplied by 10 squared (10x10) to identify the class of wicked people who are just one part of the whole of all wicked people. Sons of perdition are the one part destroyed during the harvest of the Second Woe, which corresponds to the third part of all men destroyed during Physical Armageddon. (Rev 9:18) Telestial survivors of Armageddon (Rev 9:20-21) will be reaped during the Third Woe in Revelation 19:13. The Third Woe Harvest of telestial-worthy people will come quickly after the Second Woe Harvest is complete. (Rev 11:14)

For more details about the Second Woe Harvest of all mortal sons of perdition, check out my podcasts from April 12 and 14, 2026.

April 12, 2026 — Podcast

April 14, 2026 — Podcast