OTY: The Revelation (9) - Jack Kelley
Revelation 8
The first cycle of judgments is ending. The 144,000 have been commissioned and a huge group of martyrs has arrived in Heaven. In many places on Earth war rages unchecked, with its attendant famine and pestilence, and yet in other places peace still prevails. Those lucky enough to enjoy it are fooled into thinking that soon the rest of the world will settle down too, and it'll be business as usual. Since the anti-Christ has not yet been revealed as Satan's man for Planet Earth, many still see him as a talented world leader doing his best to restore order, and despite the unprecedented death tolls and all the missing people, they still give him high ratings.
But in Heaven it's a different story, because God is about to unleash the 7 Trumpet judgments. It gives Him no pleasure to do this. But as bad as they were, the now concluding Seal Judgments simply weren't severe enough to turn man's stubborn heart back to Him. Alas, He knew it all along, but that doesn't make matters any easier. If only He didn't love them so much, He could just let them destroy each other. But while His righteousness demands justice, His love requires that He keep on trying to save them.
The Seventh Seal and the Golden Censer
When he opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven for about half an hour.
And I saw the seven angels who stand before God, and to them were given seven trumpets.
Another angel, who had a golden censer, came and stood at the altar. He was given much incense to offer, with the prayers of all the saints, on the golden altar before the throne. The smoke of the incense, together with the prayers of the saints, went up before God from the angel's hand. Then the angel took the censer, filled it with fire from the altar, and hurled it on the earth; and there came peals of thunder, rumblings, flashes of lightning and an earthquake. (Rev. 8:1-5)
The half hour of silence fills Heaven with a sense of foreboding, as if all the angels are holding their breath, waiting for the Lord to act. The post-Rapture believers on Earth know what's coming too, and their urgent prayers come up before the Throne in a giant cloud of incense.
But the time for mercy ended with the Rapture. This is a time for justice and as the angel hurls fire from the altar, God announces the coming judgments in His traditional way, with thunder, lightning and earthquakes.
The Trumpets
Then the seven angels who had the seven trumpets prepared to sound them.
The first angel sounded his trumpet, and there came hail and fire mixed with blood, and it was hurled down upon the earth. A third of the earth was burned up, a third of the trees were burned up, and all the green grass was burned up. (Rev. 8:6-7) Reminiscent of the plagues of Egypt the first judgment is upon the land. Fire breaks out over a third of the Earth, the acrid smoke from the grass and trees filling the skies above.
The second angel sounded his trumpet, and something like a huge mountain, all ablaze, was thrown into the sea. A third of the sea turned into blood, a third of the living creatures in the sea died, and a third of the ships were destroyed. (Rev 8:8-9) This judgment appears to be a giant asteroid or meteor crashing into the Earth's oceans. This has happened to Earth hundreds of times in it's history. The latest was on June 9, 2006 when a meteor slammed into Northern Norway with an impact force equal to the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima, Japan.
Astronomers are currently watching 736 potentially hazardous Near Earth objects (NEO). As of now none are projected to collide with Earth but these scientists caution us that NEO's often appear suddenly and with very little warning. How many of us knew that one was about to strike Norway?
The meteor strike referenced in this passage causes astounding devastation, turning 1/3 of the world's oceans a poisonous red color, killing 1/3 of marine life and destroying over 43,000 ships. (In 2005 there were 130,000 ships registered in 195 countries.)
The third angel sounded his trumpet, and a great star, blazing like a torch, fell from the sky on a third of the rivers and on the springs of water— the name of the star is Wormwood. A third of the waters turned bitter, and many people died from the waters that had become bitter. (Rev. 8:10-11) Now judgment falls on the world's fresh water supply. One third of it becomes poisonous because of something like a shooting star that fell from the sky. The star is named Wormwood, from the Greek word apsinthos (absinthe). Because of this, some commentators believe that the agent making the waters poisonous is radioactive contamination.
They say this because, although it's not free of controversy, the Russian word chernobyl can be translated as wormwood and on April 25 and 26 of 1986 the world's worst nuclear disaster occurred in the Ukranian city by that name. A nuclear reactor in the Chernobyl power plant exploded during testing, releasing amounts of radioactive fallout into the atmosphere 300 times greater than the atomic bomb exploded in Hiroshima. If you saw the movie "China Syndrome" you learned that out of control reactors can burrow into the ground and once that happens are all but unstoppable.
There's no official word on whether that did or can happen at Chernobyl. But containment efforts are still ongoing 20 years later, and if European aquifers become contaminated, it's easy to see how this view of Rev. 8:11 could be accurate.
The fourth angel sounded 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 turned dark. A third of the day was without light, and also a third of the night. (Rev. 8:12) Between the smoke from the grass and forest fires, and particulates thrown into the air by the meteor strike the atmosphere has become so dense that 1/3 of the light from the heavenly bodies is blocked. I'm reminded of TV footage from the fires that Saddam's troops set in Kuwait's oil fields while retreating toward the end of the Gulf War. The smoke was so dense that it was like night during the day, the sun like a dark red ball floating in the blackened sky above. That's about what it'll look like as the world awaits the fifth trumpet.
As I watched, I heard an eagle that was flying in midair call out in a loud voice: "Woe! Woe! Woe to the inhabitants of the earth, because of the trumpet blasts about to be sounded by the other three angels!" (Rev 8:13) This is no ordinary eagle. The Greek text uses the word normally translated angel, indicating some kind of supernatural messenger, sent to prepare the world for what's ahead. Four of the trumpets have sounded, and the Earth is reeling from this onslaught. But now the judgments turn supernatural and are directed at man himself. It's about to get personal.
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