Trumpets
The Revelation of King Jesus • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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· 1 viewThe main idea of this next passage is that as followers of Jesus our prayers for justice will be answered, just not in our own timing. If you do not know Jesus repent while God is still trying to get your attention.
Notes
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I was at a conference recently talking to a pastor who wasn't sure if he was an amillenialialist or post millenialist. Though I do not believe these to be biblical it got me thinking. He is a friend of mine and I told him I do not agree, and we are still friends. When it comes to stuff like this in particular. These are what is called secondary issues. Of the different main views I presented it does not effect the message of the gospel, the main goal is the same in the end. Though I do not agree on them Where does Grace come in?
I know some of you do not agree with me on my Historical stance on the end times, I do not believe in the rapture. It was explained to me this way by someone smarter then me. He said it is like a king coming into His kingdom. All His followers will come out to greet Him and bring Him in. So it will be when Jesus comes. We will go up to Him as His followers and come down with Him as He sets up His new Kingdom. I know There are a few of you out there that do not agree with me on this, and that is okay.
There are some views of the scriptures that are not biblical and I will take a stance and confront people on. Some are dangerous and have hurt a lot of people as they tried to walk with God.
But what we need to remember is for one grace. Not everyone is in the same place in their walk with God. Yes we need to stand firm on the word of God, and not budge when it comes to the essentials of the faith. but unless we walk in grace then we will not do anyone any good. Learning to walk in Grace and in truth is a hard lesson to learn. On these issues in particular, when it come to the end times and how It will all play out, we need to walk in Grace.
What do we know for sure? This we have gone through but I will reiterate the main idea here. There will be a time of Great tribulation which is giving people one last chance to turn to Jesus. This leads up to the return of Jesus where He will set up His kingdom and Judge the living and the dead. After which His followers will live with Him in eternity and those that don't follow Him will suffer the eternal wrath of God. In my sermons I hope to give you an idea of the minutia, the small details and what I believe it says and also give you the main point, this is the overarching theme that we need to understand. If you ever have any questions about what i say, let me know.
The main idea of this next passage is that as followers of Jesus our prayers for justice will be answered, just not in our own timing. If you do not know Jesus repent while God is still trying to get your attention.
The Prayers of the Saints
The Prayers of the Saints
We start out with silence.
When he opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven for about half an hour.
Why silence? It is similar to the retraining of the 4 winds that we read about earlier. Metaphorical but to a point. Verses 2-5 deal with the martyrs and their prayers so this could have something to do with the prayers of the saints being heard in heaven. But as we remember context is key, and this idea is heard elsewhere in the scriptures.
Why does it matter? because it is interesting that's why. so let us do a little cross referencing to see where else this might come up.
But the Lord is in his holy temple; let the whole earth be silent in his presence.
Be silent in the presence of the Lord God, for the day of the Lord is near. Indeed, the Lord has prepared a sacrifice; he has consecrated his guests. On the day of the Lord’s sacrifice I will punish the officials, the king’s sons, and all who are dressed in foreign clothing.
Let all humanity be silent before the Lord, for from his holy dwelling he has roused himself.”
With these things in mind what it seems like, and most interpreters agree that it is in reference to what could be considered the calm before the storm. The awesome silence before the great storm of the wrath of God. A dramatic pause, like the calm before the storm a break before the dramatic judgement of God. It puts all the focus on God as things start to happen.
The last seal ushers in the next set of judgments of God.
Then I saw the seven angels who stand in the presence of God; seven trumpets were given to them. Another angel, with a golden incense burner, came and stood at the altar. He was given a large amount of incense to offer with the prayers of all the saints on the golden altar in front of the throne.
The smoke of the incense, with the prayers of the saints, went up in the presence of God from the angel’s hand. The angel took the incense burner, filled it with fire from the altar, and hurled it to the earth; there were peals of thunder, rumblings, flashes of lightning, and an earthquake.
We go back to chapter 6 verse 10 to the pleas of those Christians that have died for their faith, how long oh lord.
We have here great symbolism of the prayers of the saints that do not go unanswered. The incense represents the prayers of the saints. The saints have been crying out for vindication. How long must this evil persist. It is with this that the judgement of God is starting to be sent into motion. God is soon going to answer the prayers of the saints.
This is something that should offer us hope. We struggle with the idea of prayer, it’s efficacy, when is it going to be answered. We have the answer to these questions.
Prayer will be answered. Though the part that we struggle with is the timing of it all. Prayer will be answered but it will be in God’s timing not ours. We must remember this.
Prayer has power but we go back to the timing of answered prayer. We need to understand that our prayer is powerful because God has said it is.
The Trumpets
The Trumpets
I want to address for a brief moment again the timing of all of this. The 3 sets of seven judgments, i do not believe them to be chronological. They do cover the same period of time but from a different perspective. The seals are depicting the judgments that reveal the inevitable consequences of human sin where as the trumpets reveal the involvement of God on bringing punishment to a wicked world. different aspects of the same thing.
The main idea? God’s judgement on a wicked world to give them one last chance to turn to Him.
so we move to the next aspect of the judgement of God on the world. Though this is the beginnings of the wrath of God being poured on the world, we must remember that it has a point. People need to understand that He is in control, and this is their last chance. Repentance from sin is the name of the game here.
We are going to be summarizing the first six trumpets in chapter 8 and 9, so follow along in your bibles.
The first angel blew his trumpet, and hail and fire, mixed with blood, were hurled to the earth. So a third of the earth was burned up, a third of the trees were burned up, and all the green grass was burned up.
This imagery comes the seventh Egyptian plague from the book of Exodus. The idea of anything turning to blood is something at least the eastern world will understand. The prophet Joel also mentioned this type of plague. Since this is a supernatural judgement there is not really any need to explain how blood and hail and fire can mix.
Great devastation is what the idea here. Taken literally it is almost absurd what this means for the world. 1/3 of the world is going to be destroyed. The reference to the destruction of trees likely means fruit trees, green grass likely all the vegetation. We also must remember that as followers of Jesus the plagues sent from God will not effect us so somehow we will be provide for but this will have a devastating effect on the rest of the world.
The second angel blew his trumpet, and something like a great mountain ablaze with fire was hurled into the sea. So a third of the sea became blood, a third of the living creatures in the sea died, and a third of the ships were destroyed.
The first plague scorched a third of the land. The second scorched a third of the sea. A third of the sea becomes blood destroying a third of the shipping and a third of the marine life. This does not have to be a literal mountain thrown into the sea. Interestingly enough, it is said that less then 20 years before this vision took place, mount Vesuvius had erupted and destroyed Pompeii. God will be the cause, the destruction will happen, as to how it remains to be seen.
Judgments that go beyond the comprehension of the human brain. The purpose of which is to lead people to repentance.
The third angel blew his trumpet, and a great star, blazing like a torch, fell from heaven. It fell on a third of the rivers and springs of water. The name of the star is Wormwood, and a third of the waters became wormwood. So, many of the people died from the waters, because they had been made bitter.
next we see a third of the fresh water contaminated. In the OT wormwood is used as a symbol for bitterness and sorrow.
The fourth angel blew his trumpet, and a third of the sun was struck, a third of the moon, and a third of the stars, so that a third of them were darkened. A third of the day was without light and also a third of the night. I looked and heard an eagle flying high overhead, crying out in a loud voice, “Woe! Woe! Woe to those who live on the earth, because of the remaining trumpet blasts that the three angels are about to sound!”
The fifth angel blew his trumpet, and I saw a star that had fallen from heaven to earth. The key for the shaft to the abyss was given to him. He opened the shaft to the abyss, and smoke came up out of the shaft like smoke from a great furnace so that the sun and the air were darkened by the smoke from the shaft.
Then locusts came out of the smoke on to the earth, and power was given to them like the power that scorpions have on the earth. They were told not to harm the grass of the earth, or any green plant, or any tree, but only those people who do not have God’s seal on their foreheads.
Darkness on the earth which most things need light to grow and to live. With the fifth angel came stinging locusts and more darkness. We have already been reminded that the judgements of God will not be for the followers of Jesus that are around, and now we read that the sealed witnesses of God will not be harmed either. The locusts will be given the power to torment all those who do not follow Jesus.
say to the sixth angel who had the trumpet, “Release the four angels bound at the great river Euphrates.” So the four angels who were prepared for the hour, day, month, and year were released to kill a third of the human race.
Lastly whoever is left, a great portion of them will be killed by the 6th plague.
it is the last two verses that are the focus of all of this though, what I want you to remember.
The rest of the people, who were not killed by these plagues, did not repent of the works of their hands to stop worshiping demons and idols of gold, silver, bronze, stone, and wood, which cannot see, hear, or walk.
Repentance is the key to all these judgments. We need to remember that All this is the judgement of God beginning to be poured out on the earth, but the goal is to get people to turn to Him. How else will they listen if they have ignored Him for so long. But peoples hearts are hardened, they do not want to listen. Some will.
So What?
So What?
What are we doing to point people to Jesus? Jesus died on the cross so we may have freedom from our sin. He died so we can go to be with Him someday. Will you choose to follow Him? your time is limited. There are two main ideas in all of this I want us to remember.
God Answers Prayers in His Timing
God Answers Prayers in His Timing
We struggle and wonder when our prayers for vindication will be answered. We pray for God’s Kingdom to come and we struggle with unanswered prayer. This is a vast subject, but with prayers for Jesus to come, for His justice and vindication it will happen. We must remember that God is in control and we are not, that He will do what He says and we can trust in His timing.
That is why this can be of great hope for us. Jesus will return, but in His timing not ours. We should therefore encourage fellow believers to continue banding together for strategic prayer on matters of long-range concern for God’s kingdom.
Repentance
Repentance
The main audience of the book of revelation is meant for followers of Jesus, but the message sent out to all is the same, you must turn from your sins before it is to late.
The message of repentance is not just for people who do not know Jesus but for His followers as well. For those that have grown to comfortable with Compromise. For those that have grown to comfortable with worldly values, for those that claim t be followers of Jesus yet are riding the fence between the world and Jesus, you must turn to Him now. There is only security in Jesus.
Though we may suffer now at the hands of the world, they will suffer worse some day then we ever will while we are here. You may think that a loving God would not do this. But How could a l;oving God allow people to go against His law, to do evil for so long without consequence.
As we read in 2 Peter, the world may scoff at us now but God will not withhold His anger forever. 2 Peter 3:14 “Therefore, dear friends, while you wait for these things, make every effort to be found without spot or blemish in his sight, at peace.”