I'm sort of digging in a little bit into the four horsemen of Revelation chapter six.  I've tentatively concluded that the Rider on the first horse is most probably the Holy Spirit, sent by Jesus as promised in John 16:7.  The "traditional" view is that the four horsemen are released in a tight sequence, all four being at the end of the church age.  But if the scroll that The Lamb takes is the "battle plan" for the redemption of Planet Earth, we can't ignore the fact that Jesus began the redemption at the time of His first coming.  His death and resurrection laid the foundation, and it was by virtue of His death and resurrection that He was the only One in creation who was found worthy to open the scroll.  I see no reason to believe He would delay at all, or any longer than necessary.  It simply appears (to me) that the work of the First Horseman took about 2,000 years of human history to complete.  Revelation discloses the sequence of events, but does not seem to reveal how much time passes on earth, either between consecutive events or for the completion of judgments.

The Holy Spirit came to earth "conquering and to conquer."  This is a bit arcane, but the Greek word nikao is translated "conquer" only here; almost everywhere else it's "overcome."  The two exceptions are in Rev. 6:5 when The Lamb PREVAILED (nikao) and in Rev. 15:2 where those who "have the victory" (nikao) over the beast are seen.  There are other forms of nikao that also appear, but pursuing them here would be a bit of a rabbit trail.

The significant theological fact is that it is only because of the indwelling Spirit and His power in our lives that we are able to overcome sin and live by faith.  Faith really is the victory that overcomes the world.  It's not by might or power, but by His Spirit.  So the statement that the Rider on the white horse comes to "conquer" is perfectly consistent with the common Christian experience of overcoming our own indwelling sin and living by His Spirit.  If we try to "muzzle the old man" by the power of the flesh, we lose.  Will power does not make for Spirit-filled living.  Rather, it's Will-surrender - surrendering our flesh and putting it to death so we can live by His Spirit.  Seen in this light, the Rider Who comes "conquering and to conquer" makes perfect sense.

But one other thing about this First Horseman is suggested by the second:  the rider on the red horse takes peace from the earth.  Now this is easy to miss, because we've had war and strife a-plenty for the past twenty centuries.  With World War 2 in living memory, and WW3 hanging over our collective heads since WW2 ended, we might think the red horse arrived a while ago.  But truth be told, if you think this is a world without peace, just wait; you ain's seen nothin' yet.

We tend to take a certain level of peace for granted:  there's always a safe haven somewhere; there's always a truce or respite from hostilities.  There's always hope for at least temporary peace now, and hope for a permanent peace in the future.  "We need to work for peace" is true for worldly peace, but the only peace worth having is not "worked for" or earned.  Rather, it's a gift sourced in God, and more than we should expect since 1) peace is a gift of God and a fruit of His Spirit, and 2) we crucified His Son.  So why should we expect the One True God, whose Son we killed, to give us a gift as precious as peace?  What an awesome God we serve!

We should also bear in mind that the "god of this world" probably figured out early-on that the crucifixion was actually a trap-door escape out of his evil domain, easily accessible to those who would simply "believe on the Son of Man."  Satan would no doubt be stirred up, and would need some sort of Restrainer to limit the damage he could do.  It may be that our work as ambassadors for reconciliation (2 Cor. 5:18) is facilitated by peace or at least some restraint on violence (Jer. 29:7, 1 Tim. 2:2).  "That which restrains" (2 Thess. 2:7) could be a Divine mandate rather than a person.

Also, "take peace" does not necessarily mean "start war."  Children can have no peace if their dad is a raging alcoholic.  A man can have no peace if his wife is aggressively contentious.  A woman can have no peace if her husband spends all the money on beer and lottery tickets.  Amp these peace-breakers up by a thousand, spread it to every home in the community, and regardless of treaties or nukes, there is no peace.  The sword given to the red horse rider seems to build on this and will be discussed in a future post.

So for the rider on the red horse to be empowered to take peace from the earth is actually a pretty big deal, and we seem to be on the threshold of that event at present.  Jesus gave peace as a gift (John 14:27) and similarly it's a fruit of the Holy Spirit (Gal. 5:22).  Grace and peace are often identified by Paul as coming from the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, and we know from James (Jas. 1:17) that peace and every other good thing has its source in God.  A word-study on "peace" would also be a rabbit trail and beyond my scope; my point is simply that the taking of peace implies a previous giving of peace:  God gave the gift, very possibly it's part of the toxon of the first Rider, and now the second rider takes that same peace.

When the red horseman begins his work, life on earth will take a hard turn in a decidedly unpleasant direction.  The "time of trial" will not be something anyone can plan ahead for, live through with silver, freeze-dried food and a Berkey water filter, or shoot your way out of.

The taking of peace, then, points strongly to the rapture, as will be explored shortly.