The Destroyer
Psalm 78: 43-48 describes the plagues that fell upon Egypt before the people of Israel was delivered from slavery. We read:
“How he had wrought his signs in Egypt, and his wonders in the field of Zoan: And had turned their rivers into blood; and their floods, that they could not drink. He sent divers sorts of flies among them, which devoured them; and frogs, which destroyed them. He gave also their increase unto the caterpillar, and their labour unto the locust. He destroyed their vines with hail, and their sycamore trees with frost. He gave up their cattle also to the hail, and their flocks to hot thunderbolts” Psalm 78:43-48
Now please read verse 49 carefully:
“He cast upon them the fierceness of his anger, wrath, and indignation, and trouble, by sending evil angels among them” Psalm 78:49
Here we are told that in the plagues that fell upon Egypt involved evil angels what can only mean they were demons. God in heaven certainly has no evil angels.
Now, can we find what the evil angels were doing in Egypt at the time of plagues?
Let us read Exodus 12:12,
“For I will pass through the land of Egypt this night, and will smite all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and beast; and against all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgment: I am the LORD” Exodus 12:12
“I WILL PASS THROUGH... AND WILL SMITE... I AM THE LORD”. From this verse it is clear that the tenth plague or destruction of the firstborn in Egypt was the judgment of the Lord. The verse indicates clearly that the Lord personally, directly, will destroy all the firstborn of Egypt, but let us read what verse 23 says in the same chapter,
“For the LORD will pass through to smite the Egyptians; and when he seeth the blood upon the lintel, and on the two side posts, the LORD will pass over the door, and will not suffer THE DESTROYER to come in unto your houses to smite you” Exodus 12:23
Here we have an entirely different picture, namely it is not the LORD who will with His hand destroy the firstborn but someone who is called "destroyer". Who is this? We have another reference to the destroyer in 1 Corinthians 10:10,
Neither murmur ye, as some of them also murmured, and were destroyed of THE DESTROYER” 1 Corinthians 10:10
This is about Israel in the desert where some of them were destroyed by the destroyer. Again this verse is not clear as to who is the destroyer. Most people think it is the Lord because, they say, He was the one who punished the people in the wilderness. Yet in Exodus 12:23 see that it can’t be the Lord for He was the one who allowed or stopped the destroyer to destroy.
Another reference to the destroyer we have in Revelation 9:11,
“And they had a king over them, which is the angel of the bottomless pit, whose name in the Hebrew tongue is Abaddon, but in the Greek tongue hath his name Apollyon” Revelation 9:11
The word “ABADDON” or “APOLLYON” means “DESTROYER”. So, this angel of the bottomless pit is the Destroyer. Who is he? The Bible explains itself,
“And the fifth angel sounded, and I saw a star fall from heaven unto the earth: and to him was given the key of the bottomless pit” Revelation 9:1
I think it is clear as to who is this star that was fallen from heaven unto the earth. It’s Satan. SATAN IS THE DESTROYER!
Ellen White confirms what we find in the Bible:
“Satan is the great enemy of God and man. He transforms himself through his agents into angels of light. In the Scriptures he is called a destroyer, an accuser of the brethren, a deceiver, a liar, a tormentor, and a murderer” (5T 137)
“Satan is the destroyer” (Banner, March 1, 1905)
So it is clear who the evil angels are who were "sent" to Egypt? It was Satan and his demons that destroyed all the firstborn of Egypt.
The Hebrew word for sending in Ps 78:49 means to release or discharge.
Now, perhaps some will jump in here complaining that I made God and Satan collaborators and friends, where Satan is fulfilling God's plans.
No, I did not do this under any circumstances. God and Satan are not friends. The truth is that Satan is a destroyer just waiting to destroy all those who are not under God's special protection. In the case of Egypt, those were all firstborn. If the power of God would not have protected others, Satan would have destroyed all Egyptians. Ellen White speaks about the impatience of the destroyer to destroy in the following:
Thus the archfiend clothes with his own attributes the Creator and Benefactor of mankind. Cruelty is satanic. God is love; and all that He created was pure, holy, and lovely, until sin was brought in by the first great rebel. Satan himself is the enemy who tempts man to sin, AND THEN DESTROYS HIM if he can; and when he has made sure of his victim, then he exults in the ruin he has wrought. If permitted, he would sweep the entire race into his net. WERE IT NOT FOR THE INTERPOSITION OF DIVINE POWER, NOT ONE SON OR DAUGHTER OF ADAM WOULD ESCAPE” (GC 534)
“Lucifer became the destroyer of those whom heaven had committed to his guardianship” (AUCR, October 1, 1906)
Now, sister White in describing the end-time judgments of God is suggesting that the judgments of Egypt were shadows and says:
“When the destroying angel was to pass through Egypt, to destroy the first-born of man and beast, Israel was commanded to gather their children and families into their houses with them, and then mark their door-posts with blood, that the destroying angel might pass by their dwellings, and if they failed to go through with this process, there was no difference made between them and the Egyptians.
The destroying angel is soon to go forth again, not to destroy the first-born alone, but "to slay utterly old and young, both men, women and little children" who have not the mark. Parents, if you wish to save your children, separate them from the world...” (RH, October 14, 1875)
So, the same destroying angel who passed through Egypt to destroy the first-born will pass through again to destroy all who have not the mark of God. Again we ask, who is this destroying angel? We already stated it was Satan but do we have more evidences for this claim? Here is the answer:
Just before the firstborn were slain in Egypt, the Lord instructed the Israelites to gather their children into their houses with them, and to strike the lintel and the two side posts of their doors with blood, so that when the destroying angel went through the land, he would recognize the houses thus marked as the dwelling places of Christ's followers, and pass over them.
Today we must gather our children about us, if we desire to save them from the destructive power of THE EVIL ONE. The conflict between Christ and Satan will increase in intensity until the end of this earth's history. We are to have faith in the blood of Christ, in order that we may pass safely through the perilous times just before us” 2SAT 199
I think this quote resolves all our doubts. There is only one who is the evil one and is the destroyer from the beginning, SATAN!
I will finish with this quote from the Spirit of Prophecy:
God keeps a reckoning with the nations. Not a sparrow falls to the ground without His notice. Those who work evil toward their fellow men, saying, How doth God know? will one day be called upon to meet long-deferred vengeance. In this age a more than common contempt is shown to God. Men have reached a point in insolence and disobedience which shows that their cup of iniquity is almost full. Many have well-nigh passed the boundary of mercy. Soon God will show that He is indeed the living God. He will say to the angels, "No longer combat Satan in his efforts to destroy. Let him work out his malignity upon the children of disobedience; for the cup of their iniquity is full. They have advanced from one degree of wickedness to another, adding daily to their lawlessness. I will no longer interfere to prevent THE DESTROYER from doing his work." (RH, September 17, 1901)
Dear brothers and sisters, in Egypt God commanded that only the first-born were to be left in the hand of the destroyer. In time of the end He will command that all who are disobedient to the good news of the gospel to be left in the hand of the enemy.
As the Lord stood at the door of the faithful in Egypt because of blood of the sacrificed lamb, so the Lord will stand again in defense of all those who have washed their robes in the blood of the true Lamb that flowed at Calvary.
May all who read these words be protected in the day of the great slaughter by THE DESTROYER.
This story was adapted and given more explanation in a booklet named the Destroyer; find it here: https://maranathamedia.com/book/view/the-destroyer
This article was also translated into Thai.
